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A Writing Chance 2024-25 opens for entries

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A WRITING CHANCE – the pioneering programme for change, produced by New Writing North and co-founded by actor and philanthropist Michael Sheen and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation – is back.

The project returns for 2024-25 to create more career-changing opportunities for new writers from working-class and lower-income backgrounds.

A Writing Chance aims to open access to the writing industries for new and aspiring writers from working-class and lower-income backgrounds and for those who face barriers due to intersecting challenges, including but not limited to ethnicity, disability, sexuality, gender identity, age and religious beliefs. 

We are looking for 16 new fiction and non-fiction writers and journalists to be part of A Writing Chance 2024-25.  

A Writing Chance was co-founded in 2021 by the actor and philanthropist Michael Sheen, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, and New Writing North. A Writing Chance 2024-25 is produced in partnership with the Daily Mirror, Faber & Faber, and Substack, with audio sponsorship from Audible. The programme is supported by research from Northumbria University and Bath Spa University.   

Successful applicants will be mentored one-to-one, over 12 months, by an experienced writer or editor from one of our partner organisations. They will also become part of a writers’ network, undertake a residential writing programme, learn how the industry works, make contacts, and receive a bursary of £2,000 to enable their participation in the programme.  

This programme runs April 2024-March 2025 and is open to writers aged over 18 and based in the UK. 

Applications are now open until 10am, Monday 8 January 2024.  

Find out more and apply here 

Read our press release