Discover how Langara College’s creative writing courses help students build community, confidence, and storytelling skills for any career path.
“I wanted to connect with more people in the writing community and build a network,” said Harman Burns, author and current Langara student. “This class let me flex different narrative muscles.”
Harman, whose debut novella Yellow Barks Spider was a Lambda Literary Award nominee in the category of Transgender Fiction, found and cultivated a community first formed in Langara’s Creative Writing - Stageplay course (ENGL 2246) under the tutelage of Kathleen Oliver, Instructor and Department Chair of the English Department
We spoke with Harman and Kathleen to learn more about the community students are granted from small class sizes, the importance of expression regardless of career, and why uncertainty in a student can be a strength.
Community inside and outside the classroom.
In Kathleen Oliver’s classroom, community begins on day one. In her Stageplay course, students co-create the workshop guidelines, collectively defining their expectations of each other and their responsibilities to each other for the duration of the course. “I want students to feel like a community of writers, a community of practice,” stated Kathleen Oliver, herself an award-winning playwright.
The small class sizes at Langara facilitated this unique merging of student and coursework. Harman credited the more intimate setting at Langara toward making everyone more comfortable in a manner that is not possible in university creative writing courses who have one instructor speaking to hundreds of students in a large lecture-hall.
“We got our desks in a circle and worked together to improve our individual work,” she said, noting that her class was less than twenty students. “Working with familiar faces allowed everyone to be more honest in our work, which improved our writing.”
Outside of class, the connections continue. Harman and her peers formed informal writing groups to exchange feedback and build their craft. She also highlighted the wider writing community at Langara, including the Strangers on a Train reading series, the W49 writing contests, and the Writer-in-Residence program.
Expression regardless of career.
The elements that characterize Langara as distinct from other post-secondary institutions in British Columbia crystallize in its creative writing course offerings. Kathleen Oliver pointed to the average age of a student and their educational backgrounds as examples.
“All of our creative writing courses currently are second year courses,” explained Kathleen. “Students are older than average and they have life experience, which is a fantastic thing to bring to a writing class.”
Because creative writing classes at Langara are not exclusively for students in the Associate of Arts Creative Writing program, students from different educational and academic backgrounds and journeys often take these courses as electives. “Students from sciences, from design, from theatre, other programs, often take these courses and create the most fascinating material,” said Kathleen.
Non-writing students love the courses. They take a break from perfectionist, goal-directed, performance-oriented courses to open themselves up and tell their story.
The ideal writing student (is you).
Kathleen sees the ideal creative student every semester. There is no one ideal writer or one ideal writing student, which she views as one of the great things about the courses. “Oftentimes, students take creative writing because they’re curious,” she explained. “Writing is for anyone with an openness to finding what they can contribute to and receive from a group of people who are in exactly the same boat.”
The sense of play and possibility is something Kathleen intentionally cultivates within her classes. Harman, who took her playwriting course, agrees that embracing uncertainty is essential. “Part of the writing process is failing,” said Harman. “So, it is important to have a comfortable and fun atmosphere.”
Above all, Harman advocated for creative writing and what it brings as beneficial for all students in any field. “It’s a beautiful skill to express yourself. It will always be important,” she said.
You don't need a budget to write. You don’t need special equipment to tell a story that means something to you. We all have stories to tell.
Learn more about the Associate of Arts Creative Writing program or tell your tale in one of our writing courses.
