Lake Erie Ink Brings Creative Writing, Community to Heights Students

Lake Erie Ink, a Cleveland Heights-based non-profit, was founded to provide “creative expression opportunities and academic support to community youth in Greater Cleveland.” And it has been doing exactly that in the Heights schools for more than a decade.

One of their core district programs is Ink Spot, an afterschool writing program currently available at Noble and Oxford Elementary Schools and Baumgardner Middle School. Students gather for two hours twice a week, enjoy a snack provided by the district, and engage in creative writing activities, with a heavy focus on social-emotional learning and youth development.

Led by an LEI teaching artist and a program assistant, students might work on anything from playwriting to story games to photography. Because the group gathers from September to May, they form deep bonds and provide vocal and enthusiastic encouragement for one another’s writing, according to Charisse Bailey, Director of Programs.

“It’s always beautiful to see Ink Spot kids encouraging other Ink Spot kids to stand up” and share their work at their twice yearly showcase events, said Bailey. These showcases, which happen in December and May, are opportunities for students to display and/or read aloud their favorite pieces of work, and often feel like community celebrations.

The showcases include the distribution of anthologies of student work, a highlight modeled after a book release. Bailey recounted the story of one student who had joined the group late and whose work was not yet in the anthology. He was adamant about creating something and sat down then and there to write. He finally stood up to read what he had told people would be a comedy routine.

“He was really nervous, you could see the tension,” said Bailey. And then he read aloud a piece “about his family and how much he loved them and how Ink Spot was like his family now.”

Not all of Lake Erie Ink’s opportunities are quite so emotional, but they all provide valuable learning experiences for young people. From after-school enrichment at Canterbury and Fairfax focused on comics and poetry to a six-week writing residency to help students write and submit essays to the prestigious Stop the Hate contest, LEI “is always looking to support the social-emotional growth and education of our students,” according to Supervisor of Community and School Partnerships Nancy Peppler.

Lake Erie Ink also runs a Poetry Club at Heights High and teaches a creative writing elective at Options School. They also partner regularly with teachers at both middle schools and the high school to come in and oversee creative writing units in their English classes. “We want kids who aren't experiencing Ink Spot regularly to still be exposed to creative writing,” said Bailey.

“They worked with over 1,200 district kids last year,” said Peppler and all at no cost to the district as many of Lake Erie Ink’s programs are grant-funded. Lake Erie Ink also offers summer and spring break camps at no or almost no cost to district students. Their spring break camp this March is free and their week-long summer camps, which run from 9am to 3pm are just $25, thanks to ARPA funding.

“They are true, deep community partners,” said Peppler. “They say yes to everything, they show up at all our events, and they support our kids creatively.”