Supported by our Programme and Partnerships Manager based in Bradford, local writers work with young people in secondary schools across North, East and West Yorkshire.
First Story dignified our students’ voices. They soon began to believe that despite often troubled relationships with education, their stories mattered. They mattered.
Reading their efforts aloud began to fill up chasms of low confidence and negative self-belief, with worthiness and pride…Students began to realise that their work didn’t have to be perfect. It just had to be their own, each word symbolising a record of achievement and a step closer to academic success.
Lisa Thompson-Gwede, lead teacher at Springwell Academy leeds
Yorkshire Advisory Group
We’re grateful to benefit from the breadth of regional knowledge and expertise provided by our volunteer advisors in Yorkshire. The group, representing arts, education and youth perspectives, meets quarterly to inform our work in the region.
Yvonne Battle-felton
Academic Director of Creative Writing, University of Cambridge ICE
Rachel Connor
Writer, certified coach, former Director of Creative Writing at Leeds Beckett University
Elvie Thompson
Lead Learning Producer North, The British Library and trustee at Leeds33
Habiba Desai
Co-Founder and Director, Fox and Windmill
Emma Keightley
Development Lead for English, Teach First
Ed hurst
Novelist and Programme Director for Creative Writing, University of Hull
Alumni voices
Habiba Desai, Bradford
First Story has had a role to play in each application I’ve submitted, in every single job and experience since. Let me say, the First Story programme makes a huge difference.
Habiba took part in the Young Writers Programme at Carlton Bolling College in Bradford in 2013/14. She went on to study English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Huddersfield. Since graduating she has held roles at Vintage, Penguin, Waterstones and the Bradford Literature Festival. Habiba is the Co-Founder of Fox and Windmill Books, an independent publishing company for South Asian British writers in the North.
Yorkshire stories
Get in touch
Ali Johnson
Programme & Partnerships Manager, Yorkshire
Ali supports our programmes in the Yorkshire region. Ali has worked at the University of Manchester and as a Centre Leader at IntoUniversity. He is passionate about ensuring that all young people have access to a rich creative education.
