Inspiration, accountability, and the tools you need to get your essays out into the world!
Join us for six months of craft lessons, workshops, editor visits, and personal editorial feedback! This small and inclusive class meets bi-weekly on Zoom, with the goal of creating an intimate, writer-based community of essayists who learn and grow together.
You’ll read, brainstorm, and write drafts. You’ll explore different essay forms and practice a variety of narrative techniques. You’ll learn tangible self-editing tools, then revise, workshop, and revise some more! You’ll discover the publications you love, whether literary or freelance in nature (or both!), and you’ll create a plan to get those bylines! You’ll receive supportive, thoughtful peer workshop feedback on six drafts. You’ll have three personal one-on-one meetings (with detailed line edits) from your instructor. You’ll meet editors, attend panels, and participate in a final online reading event to celebrate your hard work! You’ll discuss next steps in publication, including how to pitch editors and begin forming a full collection.
This workshop is for writers who already have some experience publishing personal essays in either literary or freelance publications. The workshop model will be carefully scaffolded and writer-centric, evolving as the class evolves. Writers will finish the class with ten complete drafts and a path forward for publication.
Virtual Info Session w/ Hannah Grieco!
Meet Hannah Grieco, instructor for our Personal Essays from Start to Finish workshop, and have all your questions about the program answered!
Watch the recording on YouTube »
Application Deadline: October 27, 2025
To apply, send a cover letter and a 10- to 15-page personal essay writing sample to laura.spencer@writer.org by October 27, 2025. Acceptance is competitive and applications will be considered on a rolling basis. This course is limited to 15 participants. Please note that acceptance to the program is required before registering.
Writers who are Black, Indigenous, and/or People of Color are warmly encouraged to apply. This course offers two full scholarships for BIPOC writers. To be considered for the scholarship, in addition to the regular submission, state in your application email that you would like to be considered and include a 2-3 sentence statement of need. If more than 2 applicants qualify, the scholarship recipients will be chosen from among them via lottery.
LIVE VIDEO CONFERENCE: This workshop will be held via our online video conferencing platform, Zoom. You can view brief tutorials on using the platform here. Shortly before the start date participants will receive an email with login info. Please check your spam if you don’t see it.
This Zoom class has live captioning. If you need another type of accommodation for this workshop, 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.
