The Writer’s Center presents a FREE symposium addressing the subject of caregiving (including parenting, eldercare, and other ways we give care to the world) in literature and popular culture, offering a short film screening, free creative writing workshops, and a panel discussion. Featured writers include Hannah Grieco, Steve Majors,  Seema Reza, and John Vercher. The symposium concludes with a reception for all attendees.

All events are FREE and open to the public. Limited space, registration required. The workshops are simultaneous, so please only sign up for ONE. Scroll down to register!

Check In | 1:00pm

Film Screening of We Carry On | 1:10pm

In July 2022, Wounded Warrior Project and Community Building Art Works brought together 12 caregivers of severely wounded veterans through a six-week virtual poetry workshop that culminated in an on-stage performance in Washington, D.C. We Carry On follows the caregivers as they prepare to take the stage, perform their collaborative poem, and reflect on the shared experience. Directed by Sareen Hairabedian.

Workshops | 1:30-3:00pm

Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.

• Expressive Writing for Caregivers: How storytelling helps us navigate complicated experiences | Workshop Leader: Hannah Grieco
  Many caregivers experience PTSD and/or mental and physical symptoms related to the act of caring for others. One of the most effective ways to work through complicated caregiving experiences is the act of expressive writing. In this short workshop, we’ll discuss why we write about these experiences and the many ways it helps us, the people we love, and the larger world. We’ll briefly explore the research behind expressive writing and PTSD, and then move into short readings and generative exercises. Participants will leave with a strong beginning of a personal essay or poem, as well as a clear understanding of the next steps toward publication.
• Giving Care | Workshop Leader: Steve Majors
  Caregiving in your writing also means giving care to those you write about. In this workshop, we’ll explore ways writers can protect the identities, reputations, and feelings of those they write about in nonfiction.
• This is a Love Story | Workshop Leader: Seema Reza
  This generative workshop, led by author Seema Reza, will invite participants to write a version of their story of caregiving that uses the classic love story plot points as a framework. Writers will be encouraged to use hybrid forms and experiments to discover new elements of familiar stories.
• Imagined Resolutions Through Autofiction | Workshop Leader: John Vercher
  Ever have a situation—particularly one with family—that felt unfinished? Can you recall a time when a conversation or an event with a loved one hadn’t gone the way you’d planned, the way you wanted or maybe not the way the other side planned or wanted? What if you could do it over? Do it differently? In this generative workshop, I’ll share a reading from my own work where I did just that. We’ll discuss how writing through these situations via the lens of fiction can be powerful and transformative. Then you’ll work to write your own reimagined scenes.

Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.

Panel Discussion | 3:15-4:15pm

To attend the panel and reception, please register for one of the workshops, or you can choose the panel-only option below.

• Our workshop leaders will be joined by author Melissa Scholes Young for a discussion on how the literary community addresses caregiving in all its forms. Reception to follow.

Workshop Leaders/Panelists

Hannah Grieco is the author of First Kicking, Then Not, forthcoming from Stanchion in August of 2025. She writes a literary column for Washington City Paper, edits prose at a variety of small presses and literary journals, and teaches literature at Marymount University. She also works 1:1 with writers as an editor and book coach, helping with manuscript development, agent and publishing house searches, essay and short story placement, and more. Read her work in The Washington Post, The Independent, Al Jazeera, Huffington Post, Brevity, Craft Literary, Poet Lore, Shenandoah, Fairy Tale Review, and more. Find her online at hgrieco.com and on most social media @writesloud.

Steve Majors is the author of High Yella: A Modern Family Memoir and the forthcoming graphic novel, Light Bright. Steve’s writing explores issues of race, class, culture and identity and his personal essays have been published in national outlets including the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, CNN.com and NBC Think. Steve’s writing skills were honed as a journalist. For many decades he worked as a TV producer, first in major TV markets across the country, and then in New York where he held successive leadership positions at CNBC, MSNBC and NBC’s Weekend TODAY show. Most recently, he’s led marketing and communications for national nonprofits. He is currently chief of external affairs at Teach For America. He’s a vocal advocate on behalf of youth issues and in that capacity has been interviewed by the Washington Post and appeared on NPR, MSNBC and NBC/Current.

Seema Reza is a writer and performer and the author of When the World Breaks Open and A Constellation of Half-Lives. Based in Maryland, she is the CEO and founder of Community Building Art Works, an organization that encourages the use of the arts as a tool for narration, self-care and socialization among a military population struggling with emotional and physical injuries. Her writing has been widely anthologized and has appeared in the Washington Post, McSweeney’s, The LA Review, and LitHub among others.

John Vercher lives in the Philadelphia region with his wife and two sons. He has a Bachelor’s in English from the University of Pittsburgh and an MFA in Creative Writing from the Mountainview Master of Fine Arts program. John serves as an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of English & Philosophy at Drexel University and was the inaugural Wilma Dykeman writer-in-residence at the University of North Carolina, Asheville. His latest novel, Devil Is Fine, has received starred reviews from Booklist and BookPage, was named one of the 100 Must-Read Books of 2024 by TIME Magazine, a Best Novel of 2024 by Electric Lit, Jezebel, and The Chicago Public Library, a finalist for the Audie audiobooks award in literary fiction, and was longlisted for the 2025 Aspen Words Literary Prize and The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.

Melissa Scholes Young is the author of the award-winning novels Flood and The Hive. She received the Shelf Unbound Best Book Award in 2017 and 2021 and the Next Generation Indie Book Award in 2023. She’s published two chapbooks, Scrap Metal Baby and Guinea Pig. She serves as Editor of Grace in Darkness, Furious Gravity, Grace in Love, and Grit & Gravity, anthologies by DC women writers. Her essays have appeared in the Atlantic, Ms., Washington Post, Poets & Writers, Literary Hub, and Believer Magazine. A first generation college student from Hannibal, Missouri, she is Professor in the Literature Department of American University and in the MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Kentucky.

If you need an accommodation for this event, please contact us at access@writer.org. We will attempt to fulfill all requests, but advance notice is necessary to arrange for some accessibility services.

Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.

If a workshop is full, you can join the waitlist by sending an email to zach.powers@writer.org specifying the workshop you’re interested in attending.