A youth literacy group in East Van uses flexibility and fun to engage underserved kids

There was a gentle hum of activity in the Writers’ Exchange (WE) classroom and offices when I arrived on a hot midsummer day. A few staff members were chatting by the fridge in the kitchen area, while about six to eight students and instructors gathered for one of their literacy programs. 

I had walked in on one of the organization’s summer programs, which has about 170 kids enrolled this summer, WE’s co-founder Jennifer MacLeod told me when we sat down to chat.

The Writers’ Exchange, a charitable organization founded in 2011, runs 15 programs at elementary and high schools in East Vancouver during the school year, plus a high school transition program for Grade 6 and 7 students. Their mission is to support under-resourced kids and youth to build their confidence and excitement around reading and writing.

“Everything we do is kid-inspired and youth-led,” MacLeod said, describing how every literacy session is flexible, with instructors having the leeway to change and adapt activities based on kids’ needs and interests. They also have a youth advocacy committee, MacLeod said, which provides another opportunity for participants to share their opinions and feedback about WE’s programs and offerings.  

All the weekly programs are provided free of charge and typically include snacks or meals and transportation.

The Writers’ Exchange’s second-floor offices sit in the busy 800 block of East Hastings in Strathcona, kitty corner from the RayCam Co-operative Centre. They’ve been in that same building, in two different units, for over a decade, McLeod said.

Everything the organization does is focused on East Van. That’s because Writers’ Exchange’s mission is to run its literacy programs in spaces, like schools and community centres, attended by under-resourced kids and youth. “That’s predominantly East Vancouver… it’s just the layout of the city,” McLeod said, adding they’ve done some programming in South Vancouver, which is another area where there aren’t enough resources.  

“We're there for the long term with every community partner we work with,” McLeod said, adding that, because of that commitment, they put a lot of work into making decisions about expanding their programming to new schools and facilities. 

“When we find a really big partner who aligns with what we're doing, and they really need us, and the kids and the youth in their programs would really benefit from what we do, we try as hard as we can to make that happen,” McLeod said, explaining that much of that decision comes down to funding. 

They operate programs in elementary schools like Queen Alexandra, Thunderbird, χpey̓, and ¿uuqinak'uuh Grandview, among others, and at high schools like Van Tech and Templeton. 

The Writers’ Exchange was inspired by 826 Valencia, a San Francisco-based organization co-founded in 2002 by celebrated American author Dave Eggers. Since then, the 826 model has inspired more than 70 writing organizations around the world working with under-resourced youth. 

WE’s operations cost a bit over $600,000 per year, with nearly 90% of its revenues coming from private grants and individual donors. They also have a good relationship with their landlord, Low Tide Properties, who give them a discount on their rent and put together back-to-school kits for all the kids in the WE programs. 

One whole wall of the office is covered in copies of paperback books that have been published by WE, organized by year and going back a decade. They’re what’s known as chapbooks, filled with students’ stories, cartoons, and artwork. 

At the end of each year, the organization hosts book launch celebrations, where kids can share what they’ve written and created with friends, family, caregivers, and community members.  

“They're so proud of it, because it's a really big deal to be a published author… it’s just such a huge piece of what we do,” MacLeod said. 

As we sit in their shared office, MacLeod and volunteer coordinator Matt Layzell point out a “jenga” calendar full of sticky notes to organize and schedule the 80 to 90 volunteers of varying ages and demographics that work with WE every year. 

“That's one of the toughest things, is slotting [volunteers] into what programs they can make work for their schedule, making sure everybody it all fits,” MacLeod explained. 

“It’s really amazing how much the volunteers do,” MacLeod said, given that they ask volunteers to make a weekly commitment for a full school term. They do that because they find it takes time for kids and youth to build connections with program leaders, and having a trusting relationship is so important in getting kids to participate. 

Layzell said many of their volunteers are people who return year after year, with some of them having spent as much as 10 years working with Writers’ Exchange. Others participated in the programs as kids and youth, and now volunteer as a way to stay involved.

One of those participants-turned-volunteers is Benny Deng, who began attending Writers’ Exchange programs in grade three. Deng is now graduating from high school and has been volunteering as a program leader for the past two years. 

Over about a decade in the program, Deng said he’s gotten to know a lot of people in the community, and learned networking and other social skills, on top of the literacy skills that are WE’s primary focus. 

Deng mentioned the yearly chapbooks as an exciting project for him, reflecting on how he’s seen them change over the years.

“Early on, they were all super thin, now it’s a thick chapbook. That just tells you how many people are joining Writers’ Exchange,” Deng said. 

As part of their programming, WE collaborates with numerous local businesses to showcase students’ work, creating creative opportunities for the kids and their families to see their ideas out in the world. 

One of those is asking kids to dream up their own flavours of ice cream. For the past several years, WE has partnered with Vancouver ice cream company Rain or Shine to actually produce some of those flavour combinations, which Rain or Shine then sells in its stores. The kids get to try them as well, of course, to make sure they live up to their vision. 

This fall, the Writers’ Exchange is putting on a breakfast fundraiser where they’re challenging adults to work in teams to create an original piece of creative writing, with the help of a WE volunteer, of course. Each team will read their piece to the group, and a winner will be crowned by the experts – a group of youth judges from their programs. 

The event will take place on October 24 in Strathcona. If that sounds fun and you’d like to participate and financially support Writers’ Exchange, you can email [email protected] for more details.