Eastern offers students an opportunity to break out of their shells through a creative writing camp geared toward thinking and writing innovatively.

The camp runs from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. on June 21 through June 25 in Blair Hall.

The camp costs $85 for the whole week, which includes both two-hour sessions each day.

The Coles County Art Council provides two scholarships to local students for the camp.

Letitia Moffitt, assistant professor of English, said she teaches a creative writing camp for high school students with the help of Eastern students.

She said working with the high school students is not much different than working with the college students.

Moffitt said she encourages the high school students to use their imagination and think outside the box just like she does with her college students.

“My main goal is to inspire them to write and get their creative juices flowing,” she said.

Moffitt said each exercise or activity is designed to inspire creativity.

“They do unusual exercises that require them to use writing techniques they may have never used before,” she said.

Moffitt said she started working at the camp because she wanted to do more activities with creative writing, which would bring the community together and help students to express themselves.

Next year, she said she plans to do more recruiting and advertising to hopefully increase student enrollment.

Bryan Hebeler, a graduate student in the English department, said he helped in an exercise where students had to make up their own character.

He said the students were paired up and given a bag of items to inspire their creativity when making up their character.

Hebeler also had the students write about their earliest memories or a dream they could remember the most.

Hebeler said he was impressed with the things the students have come up with.

“I hope it has been as fun for them as it has been for me,” he said.

Another student helper, Matt Schumaker, Eastern alumni, said he has had a lot of fun working the camp.

Schumaker also assisted in an exercise where he laid out different paintings for the students to look at.

He said he had the students look at the paintings and create a story about the painting. Schumaker said this exercise was the most successful so far.

He said he made up this exercise because he wanted the students to think and tell a story.

“I wanted them to know that there is always a story to tell,” he said. “Painters have a story in mind when they paint, just like writers write stories.”

Max Gubbins, a 13-year-old participant from Charleston, said he found out about the camp in a pamphlet that listed all the Eastern camps.

Gubbins said he chose this camp because he has always had an interest in writing.

“My favorite activity by far has been making up our own characters,” he said.

Gubbins said he has learned how to better describe things in his stories since being in the camp and also his all around writing.

Abby Allgire can be reached at 581-7942 or alallgire@eiu.edu.

Chris Houchins, Eastern English Graduate Student (right) leads students through a creative writing exercise at the Creative Writing Camp in Blair Hall Tuesday afternoon. (Charles LeGrand

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