Conference
On Writing for Young People: Conference 2025
Leaf Journal’s annual conference is back! This year we will be gathering online on Thursday 20th and Friday 21st November to hear from a wonderful mix of invited keynote speaker, panel presentations from our wider community, and writing workshops. This year our keynote speaker will be Abie Longstaff, best-selling author of The Fairytale Hairdresser series and Chair of the Society of Authors' Children's Writers and Illustrators Group.
Call for Papers/Workshops!
At this point, we warmly invite proposals from our wider community for topics they would like to present on at the conference. If selected for the programme, we will ask you to pre-record a 10-15 minute talk on that topic (your ‘paper’) and then attend the conference live to take part in a Q&A session. Papers can be on any subject likely to be of interest to the Leaf Journal community of practitioners. These might be insights gained through creative writing; discussions of literature with a writerly application; reflections on the industry as it relates to writers, and more. Take a look at the articles we have previously published to see the breadth of our interests. Papers with a purely English Literature approach are unlikely to make the cut.
We are also seeking creative writing workshop proposals. Any activity you would like to lead should be suitable for an online audience (max capacity 100) and last between 30-60 minutes. There should be a practical creative writing task for the audience to participate in as part of your workshop proposal.
Initially, we only need a proposal for your paper or workshop. Proposals of up to 200 words should be emailed to LeafJournal@bathspa.ac.uk, please also include a short biography of up to 150 words. If you would like to see an example proposal you can do so here. Closing date for proposals is Monday 11th August at 5pm (UK time).
Key information for presenters and workshop leaders:
- Send a proposal (max 200 words) and bio (max 150 words) to LeafJournal@bathspa.ac.uk by 11th Aug at 5pm (UK time)
- Your place on the conference programme will be confirmed by mid-Sept 2025. If you are not offered a place, you will receive feedback on your proposal
- You will be asked to pre-record your paper (as an oral presentation, no more than 15 minutes long) by 31st Oct 2025
- You will be invited to attend the online conference live on 20th or 21st Nov for a Q&A on your paper.
- Presenters and workshop leaders will receive a free ticket for the conference.
As well as panellists and workshop leaders, we are also looking for two people to help us with the running of the conference. These are voluntary roles (as are all roles at Leaf Journal) full details can be found on the Get Involved page.
