January Online Course: Beginnings and Endings AND Christmas Raffle!

On By wendycatpratt

Below you’ll find details of the latest, brand new, online course starting 1st January AND an exciting Christmas raffle in which you can win one of several prizes. For each ticket sold, £1 will be donated to SANDS Stillbirth and Neonatal Death charity. Scroll down to find out more.

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Beginnings and Endings

In January I will be running a brand spanking new online course called Beginnings and Endings.

How it Works 

Starting on January 1st, this course will run until 31st of January. Each week you’ll receive course notes that explain the theme for the week, and every day you will receive a brand new prompt, delivered straight into your email box, aimed at getting you putting pen to paper, fingers to keyboard to get a first draft of a poem, a piece of fiction or a piece of non fiction written. This is a no pressure course. You don’t have to produce anything if you don’t want to and we all know how life gets in the way sometimes so there is no need to post anything in the closed facebook group, which you will automatically be invited to.

The course is aimed at any level of writer, from beginners to more experienced writers. You’ll be able to join in discussions in the closed Facebook group, which will be moderated daily by myself. The group is friendly and welcoming and you’ll receive basic tips and advice from myself alongside lots of encouragement.

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What’s it About?

January is the start of the year, a time to refocus and look at what we want to achieve over the months to come. This course will encourage you to think about first lines, first paragraphs, first stanzas, last paragraphs endings and that crucial last line. It’s all about the hook at the beginning and the punch at the end. But we’ll also be reflecting on, and writing about, your own personal beginnings, your first times, the endings in your life that have meant something to you as well as looking outwards to the beginnings of civilisations, the ends of eras and the state of the world in general.

Sounds like something you’d be interested in?

How to Sign Up

I now have a simple payment method in my shop where you can make a payment to sign up. If the email address you want your course materials sent to is different to your PayPal address, let me know by emailing me at wendyprattfreelancewriter@gmail.com. To make things fair, and to make sure that my courses are available to those on lower incomes, I have a tiered pricing system. Details below. And don’t forget, you can sponsor a place for a writer who doesn’t have the money to sign up. What a great Christmas gift that would be! I currently have three sponsored places, so drop me a line at wendyprattfreelancewriter.com for details. You’ll not be interrogated.

Payment Tiers

For this course, and all future courses, I am bringing in a method of tiered payment, a ‘pay what you can’  method which relies on the honesty of course attendees. There are three payment levels: £20, £40 and £60. There is also the option to sponsor another place at the price level of your choice so that I can support disadvantaged writers.

Why I have given the option to pay more

Lots of previous attendees have told me, during feedback sessions, that they would have paid much more for one of these courses, comparing it to other courses available to them. But at the same time, lots of people have told me they were grateful for the lower cost as it meant they could afford to develop their writing within their own means. I am from a working class background and still live in a working class town. There’s a grey area when it comes to WC folk, and it’s the place where almost everyone I know lives – the place where you are certainly not living in poverty, but you can’t justify retreats, courses or workshops because there is always something else (Christmas, birthdays etc).
It’s my opinion that everyone should have access to exploring their world through the arts, creative writing is my niche and in a world in which the arts are being slowly eroded, where funding is reduced and reduced, I feel I need to do something practical to help people like me, from my background. At the same time, as a working class writer and workshop facilitator, I need to be able to pay my bills and continue doing the things that I have trained for. Hence the option to pay more if you feel you can.
I know from experience how difficult it is to work out which level is right for you, so I have put some guidance together, below. I’ve based my reasoning mainly on the value of £20 in relation to  food and alcohol for some reason:

Sponsored Place – 

If you would need to make a choice between the course and essentials like food and electricity, then you are most likely entitled to a sponsored place.  Get in touch at wendyprattfreelancewriter@gmail.com for a chat. I don’t interrogate, this is an honesty system and giving writers a leg up is important.

£20 

If £20 is what you might spend on a takeaway and a bottle of wine, this is probably the tier for you.

£40

If £20 is what you spend on a bottle of wine and a nice bar of chocolate, the forty pound tier sounds about right for you.

£60

If twenty pounds is the amount that you might put into a charity box, or a church collection, then this is probably the tier for you.

YOU CAN SPONSOR A PLACE

Even if you aren’t interested in doing the course, you can still sponsor a place and give a leg up to a writer who has hit hard times and can’t justify the disposable income for a creative writing course. If you ARE doing the course, you can also sponsor an extra place. You might choose to pay £40 for yourself and sponsor a £20 place, you might be an absolute angel and pay £60 and still sponsor a £20 place, you might be a virtual saint and sponsor two £60 places. It’s up to you. Mix and match.

 

Christmas Raffle

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This year I am running a Christmas raffle with some brilliant prizes. Each ticket is £5 and   £1 from every ticket sold will be donated to SANDS the Stillbirth and Neonatal Death charity, who do fantastic work supporting people like me, who have experienced baby loss.

The best bit:

Prizes

  1. A gift voucher for one week’s mentoring to include critique and feedback on four poems, two writing prompts with feedback and a thirty minute one to one conducted via messenger. Worth £50
  2. Critique, guidance and feedback on three poems. Worth £24
  3. Two signed copies of my current collection with Valley Press. Worth £24 (including postage and packaging).

The draw will be on 17th December, and prizes will be posted on 18th December, the last UK Christmas postage date, so make sure you check your emails on the 17th so that I can get your details in time! You are quite welcome to buy a ticket if you don’t live in the UK, but please be aware that your prize won’t arrive until after Christmas.

How to buy a ticket

Simply head over to the shop where you’ll find a simple PayPal button for your purchase. Good luck, and thank you for helping me to make a donation to a charity that means so much to me.

thank you heart text
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One thought on “January Online Course: Beginnings and Endings AND Christmas Raffle!”

  1. Pingback: The December Round Up Blog – WendyPratt

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