Story Factory
Western Sydney Campaign Impact Report 2018-2021
Nelson Meers Foundation have proudly supported The Story Factory since 2012. This wonderful organisation enriches the lives of marginalised young people through creative writing and storytelling. Below are extracts from their Western Sydney Campaign Impact Report.
“Reading is access, but writing is agency - without strong writing skills, children cannot actively engage in their education. Each week, our expert Storytellers and trained volunteer tutors work with close to one thousand marginalised young people in Western Sydney in our creative writing programs, improving their writing skills, amplifying their voices, and expanding their future prospects.”
Western Sydney is a diverse and vibrant area of New South Wales, with significant Indigenous and culturally and linguistically diverse communities. Young people in this region have lower educational outcomes than their peers in metropolitan Sydney, and are at significant risk of leaving school early, with lower literacy levels than their peers and drastically reduced future educational and employment prospects.
Our creative writing programs address these inequalities and have proven impacts for young people, including increased academic engagement and ability. We also offer young people the chance to represent themselves and their communities in their writing, which we then amplify through publication to celebrate the experiences and voices of diverse young Australians.
VIVIAN’S STORY
One of our incredible young writers is Vivian Pham, who in 2017 participated in Year of the Novella, a year-long program of weekly workshops in which students aim to write a novella of up to 30,000 words, which is then professionally published. Aged just 16, Vivian wrote a 90,000 word novel over the course of the program, focused on two Australian-Vietnamese families living in 1998 Cabramatta, a diverse area of Western Sydney, which is in many ways inspired by her father and his story.
As part of the Novella program, editors from Penguin Random House volunteered to edit the writing of young authors in preparation for publication. The senior editor assigned to work with Vivian was blown away by her extraordinary writing, and the discovery of her talent led to her manuscript going to auction, with Penguin Random House signing Vivian to the Vintage imprint in 2018.
Vivian’s novel, The Coconut Children, was published in March 2020 to great acclaim. Vivian has since won the 2021 Sydney Morning Herald/Age Best Young Novelist of the Year award, and the 2021 Matt Richell Award for New Writer of the Year.
Reflecting on the impact of the Year of the Novella program on her life, Vivian commented: “The Novella Project has changed the way I do things. It has somehow given me the courage to test my own boundaries and overcome the very things I always told myself were impossible. If you told me a year ago that I would soon write a 93,000-word story that I’m actually proud of, that I’d learn to have faith in the good of people again, that I’d be this senselessly happy all of the time, then I’d probably laugh in your face. But this is exactly what The Novella Project has done for me. Working on our novellas has taught us to listen to our own voices and trust that there’s value in what we have to say. It taught us that stories can change the world, one person at a time - and the world begins with us.”
ELA’S STORY
Ela Pinar was the very first student in our Year of Poetry program, in which Western Sydney teenagers from diverse backgrounds are supported to write and professionally publish original poetry anthologies over 12 months. Ela joined our workshops in 2018 at age 16, and despite initially being the only student, continued to attend workshops each week. As new students started to join the program, she became a leader and mentor for other young people.
Ela participated in the Year of Poetry program in both 2018 and 2019, during which she professionally published two poetry anthologies. Ela’s poetry talent has led her to compete in the Bankstown Poetry Slam, becoming a monthly finalist in March 2019 and May 2020, a finalist in the 2020 Grand Slam, third place winner in April 2021, and people’s choice award winner at the Brave New Word Youth Poetry competition.
Since April 2019, Ela has also volunteered at Story Factory as a creative writing tutor, acting as a role model for over 100 younger students from Western Sydney. In recognising Ela’s gift for working with young people, we were incredibly proud to hire her in 2020 to coordinate our ‘Factory Feedback’ program, in which she facilitates young people becoming published and paid writers.
Speaking of her participation in Story Factory’s Year of Poetry program, Ela reflected: “Spending a year on my poetry has been life-changing. To have my poetry published has always been a dream of mine. Coming here I’ve learnt, I’ve always had a voice, Story Factory just taught me how to use it.”
Western Sydney is a diverse and vibrant area of New South Wales, with significant Indigenous and culturally and linguistically diverse communities. Young people in this region have lower educational outcomes than their peers in metropolitan Sydney, and are at significant risk of leaving school early, with lower literacy levels than their peers and drastically reduced future educational and employment prospects.
Our creative writing programs address these inequalities and have proven impacts for young people, including increased academic engagement and ability. We also offer young people the chance to represent themselves and their communities in their writing, which we then amplify through publication to celebrate the experiences and voices of diverse young Australians.
Feedback
Delivering the books to classes and letting our students know that they were published authors was the highlight of my week. So many students experienced a pure moment of joy, others were shocked and then reinforced that their work was real and valued... [Story Factory's ] work in our school, although only brief, has had such an impact. Our students continued writing throughout the year, and the love of words is growing.
- Principal, Ajuga School
Thank you for helping me unlock my writing abilities and giving me the confidence to share my work...The facilitators make writing fun and they make it very easy to start writing. I also love the feedback and the way you make the different ways of writing easy to understand.
- Student, After-school Program
How You’ve Helped Us Change Young Lives
In response to growing demand, we opened a second Story Factory centre in Parramatta in June 2018, and were generously supported by you to extend our reach in under-resourced communities in Western Sydney. We aimed to double our reach and impact over three years.
Prior to our Western Sydney Campaign, we were working with approximately 1,280 young people in Western Sydney each year, and were on a trajectory to work with up to 3,840 students over three years.
We are thrilled to report that your support has made it possible for us to work with 13,555 young people from under-resourced communities in Western Sydney from July 2018 – June 2021, more than tripling our impact over three years. We have both extended our reach and deepened our engagement throughout the region. We are privileged to have worked with a massive 86 schools and 17 community groups across Western Sydney, delivering a wide variety of engaging and inspiring creative writing workshops to young people experiencing disadvantage.
With your help, these young people have built their literacy, creativity and confidence, and have been empowered with the skills and confidence to find their voice and shape their future.
Evaluation and Impact
The results of our Western Sydney evaluations have been overwhelmingly positive, and have highlighted the positive impact of our workshops on students’ writing, literacy skills and confidence.
Our new evaluation framework was developed in 2019 with consultants Clear Horizon, and focuses on gathering qualitative and quantitative feedback from both students and teachers to measure the impact of our programs.
Both the teachers and the students love working with the Story Factory. You support students to engage with concepts and express ideas in ways that they would not normally have access to. It is also a great professional opportunity for teachers to expand their ideas and strategies.
- Head Teacher Engagement, Fairfield High School Intensive English Centre
Evaluations have demonstrated key positive outcomes of our programs, including:
72% of teachers reported that most or all of their students were more confident writers as a result of our program.
69% of teachers reported that most or all of their students improved their literacy as a result of our program.
88% of teachers reported that the students transferred their newly improved skills to writing outside of workshops.
75% of students felt they were better at writing after participating in Story Factory workshops.
33% The average writing confidence levels of surveyed students increased by 33%, with 72% of students reporting feeling confident or very confident about writing after participating in Story Factory workshops compared to 39% before participating in Story Factory workshops.
https://www.storyfactory.org.au/