Everett Community College Based Poetry Northwest Receives $10,000.00 Grant

Shout out to local poetry artists and advocates after word in from Everett Community College of a significant grant to Poetry Northwest. Here are the details.

A $10,000 grant awarded to Poetry Northwest by the National Endowment for the Arts will support the literary journal’s new initiative to recognize, publish and celebrate the work of Indigenous writers.

Poetry Northwest, which is based at Everett Community College as part of EvCC’s Written Arts program, will use the grant funding to support production of its magazine, and to showcase Indigenous voices with the Native Poets Torchlight Series and the new James Welch Prize.

“We’ve been very fortunate over the years to receive substantial support from our local community,” said Kevin Craft, Poetry Northwest publisher and executive editor. “A grant from the NEA is a big lift in national prestige. It validates our efforts to remain in print, to reach and reflect a diverse and growing literary audience.”

The Native Poets Torchlight Series spotlights a Native American poet on Poetry Northwest’s website, www.PoetryNW.org. When public readings are allowed again, Poetry Northwest plans to continue collaborating with the Hibulb Cultural Center in Tulalip to host poetry readings for Native and other visiting poets.

The grant will also support a new collaborative initiative, the James Welch Prize. The prize is named in honor of James Welch, the Blackfeet poet and novelist whose early work appeared in Poetry Northwest.

This major new national prize was developed in conjunction with several partners, including Seattle Arts & Lectures, Hugo House, Beargrass Writer’s Workshop and In-Na-Po. The prize is funded in large part by a successful Kickstarter campaign held last fall which attracted widespread support. More info on the James Welch Prize and prize sponsors is available at www.PoetryNW.org.

Poetry Northwest was also awarded an Everett Cultural Arts Commission grant for 2021, along with another sustaining grant from the Community Foundation of Snohomish Country’s Robyn Johnson Poetry Fund. Together these three grants will ensure another year of print and digital publishing, and help the magazine expand its national presence.

Poetry Northwest, the northwest’s oldest literary magazine, was founded in 1959. It is an independent, autonomous nonprofit organization dependent on subscriber and community support.

In January 2010, Poetry Northwest’s Board of Directors appointed EvCC English instructor Kevin Craft the fifth editor of the magazine. Craft returned the editorial offices to the greater Seattle area, reaching an agreement with Everett Community College to house and publish to magazine at Everett, where it plays in integral role in EvCC’s Written Arts Associate in Fine Arts program. Since 2016, Craft has served as Publisher and Executive Editor of Poetry NW Editions, beside fellow English department faculty member and Managing Editor Aaron Barrell. More than 130 students have completed graphic design and editing internships in the past 10 years.