Children's Writing Fellow
The Children's Writing Fellowship was created as part of Queen’s University and the Arts Council of Northern Ireland's (ACNI) joint ten-year Seamus Heaney Legacy project supported by the Atlantic Philanthropies. Fellows are selected by an expert panel, to be based at the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen’s for two years, working with students and engaged in outreach activities.
26 January, 2021
Our Children's Writing Fellow, Kelly McCaughrain, and Fighting Words NI are making tiny masterclasses to help schools and homeschoolers incorporate creative writing into lessons, and help the next generation of young writers find their words.
Kelly McCaughrain (2019-21)
Kelly McCaughrain is a Young Adult writer from Belfast. She studied Creative Writing at Queen’s and mentors young writers at Fighting Words. Her first novel, Flying Tips for Flightless Birds, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal, and won the Children's Books Ireland Eilis Dillon Award, Children's Choice Award and Book of the Year Award 2019, and also won the Northern Ireland Book Award 2019.
Myra Zepf (2017-19)
Myra Zepf is the first ever Children's Writing Fellow for Northern Ireland. Her picture book Don't Go to School!, first published in Irish, was nominated for the Children's Book of the Year in Ireland. She has also written historical fiction – Tubaiste ar an Titanic and Lá Leis na Lochlannaigh. She was three times nominated for the Reics Carló Book of the Year Award.