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Split This Rock Poetry Festival 2020 - Sarah Browning Travel Scholarship Fund

Online Registration Closed

Festival contact

Split This Rock will enter a fallow season on July 1, 2021, and all of our external programming and publishing efforts are on pause until April 1, 2022. We’re excited for time to dig into deeper wells of creativity for: 1) expanding the organizations’ capacity for working towards liberation; 2) defining more concretely what working towards liberation means at Split This Rock; 3) increasing the impact of our poetry, resistance, and community building offerings; and 4) more deeply aligning the organization’s mission with its systems, protocols, and practices. Learn more about the inspiration, projects, and goals for fallow season at the News from Split This Rock webpage. Visit the fallow season webpage to explore responses to frequently asked questions. We’re eager to continue engaging with you! To be invited to fallow season community gatherings we’ll be hosting, be sure to complete this online form.

“When I led Split This Rock, I had many dreams for the work that I could not accomplish, due to financial or time constraints. One was to provide travel funds for low-income poet-activists to attend Split This Rock Poetry Festival. The organization could give out all the scholarships folks requested, but if they didn’t have the funds to travel to DC and stay in our increasingly expensive national capital, they couldn’t attend. It broke my heart when several people scheduled to present at the 2018 fest had to cancel for exactly this reason. So, I decided to do something about it. I’m excited to join the staff and board of Split This Rock in announcing the Sarah Browning Travel Scholarship Fund.” - Founding Director Sarah Browning


Split This Rock Poetry Festival: Poems of Provocation & Witness 2020 will be held on March 26-28, 2020 in Washington, DC -- and it's important to us that the cost of travel to the gathering isn't prohibitive. In honor of founding director Sarah Browning and with the generous support of her family, Split This Rock is thrilled to offer scholarships to support travel and lodging for four (4) people to attend Split This Rock Poetry Festival 2020.

Awards cover the cost of travel and lodging only. Registration subsidies are available. For information on how to apply, please visit the Registration Subsidy Fund page on our website. 

Due Dates

  • Online or email applications are due February 10, 2020.
  • Mailed applications must be postmarked no later than February 3, 2020.

Criteria

Awards from the Sarah Browning Travel Scholarship Fund are granted primarily based on economic need, though reviewers will also consider the potential impact of attending the Festival for both attendee and the gathered community. Split This Rock is committed to welcoming a vibrant diversity of poets, activists, organizers, scholars, educators, and students to its poetry festivals. Priority is given to Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, disabled poets and activists, SGL/LGBTQ+ poets and activists, undocumented poets and activists, youth and seniors, and poets and activists from other groups experiencing structural and historical violence.

How to Submit an Application

To apply, complete the online application form at Submittable. If Submittable is not accessible to you, you may submit your request by email or mail.

Include the following in your emailed or mailed request:

  • Your name
  • Your full contact information (mailing address, email, and phone number)
  • In 200 words or less, please briefly share why you want to attend the 2020 Poetry Festival, how it would impact you, what you want to share or offer, and what kind travel support you would need to attend. Though it is not required, feel free to include any relevant information about your background, poetry, community work, or organizational affiliation. If you are presenting at the Festival, please include the title of the session(s). Please do not send files for poems or a résumé, but short statements and direct links to examples are fine!

If requesting by email, send your request by email as an attached Word document to info@splitthisrock.org with the subject: SARAH BROWNING TRAVEL SCHOLARSHIP APPLICATION - [YOUR NAME]

To send your request by mail, address your envelope as follows:

Split This Rock - Sarah Browning Travel Scholarship Application
1301 Connecticut Ave NW, Suite 600
Washington, DC  20036

Please complete the online application form through Submittable by February 10, 2020 to be considered for an award. Mailed applications must be postmarked no later than February 3, 2020. Scholarship recipients will be notified by February 18, 2020.