Now in its eleventh year, The Adroit Journal’s Summer Mentorship Program is an online program that pairs established writers with high school students (including graduating seniors) and gap year students (Classes of ’22 or ’23) interested in learning more about the creative writing processes of drafting, redrafting and editing.

The 2023 program will cater to poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction/memoir. The aim of the mentorship program is not formalized instruction, but rather an individualized, flexible, and often informal correspondence. Poetry students will share weekly work with mentors and peers, while fiction and creative nonfiction/memoir students will share biweekly work with mentors and peers.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW OUR 2023 MENTORSHIP INFO BOOKLET!

The 2023 application deadline passed on March 15, 2023. The 2023 mentorship program will last from June 19th until July 31st.

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We’ll notify you when two weeks, one week, and three days remain to apply to the 2023 Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program, as well as when applications open. Note: If you are subscribed to our mailing list, you will already receive these updates.

We are very proud of our alumni. Students have subsequently been recognized through the National YoungArts Foundation & United States Presidential Scholar in the Arts designation, the National Scholastic Art & Writing Awards and National Student Poets Program, and the Foyle Young Poet of the Year Awards, among a plethora of others.

Over 65% of mentorship graduates have matriculated at Ivy League universities, Stanford, Oxford, and Cambridge. Click here to view the mentorship alumni college list.

Applicants should possess a firm work ethic and some familiarity with the writing and revision process; should be comfortable with receiving (and giving) commentary and critique; and should be prompt and generous communicators. Applicants should also possess the will to explore and improve!

Tuition for participation in the full program is $450/student. Please note that there is no application fee. Furthermore, we want to assure applicants for whom tuition will be a barrier that fee remission and financial aid will be available. Need for financial assistance will be addressed entirely separately and will not be an influencing factor on mentorship admission decisions. Program administrators and application readers will not have access to financial need information until after admission decisions have been made.

This opportunity will not offer academic credit (this is a mentorship, not a class!), and participation in this workshop is not a route to publication in The Adroit Journal. At the end of the day, we are looking for captivating, compelling potential—writers with the drive to explore and discuss, to be active participants, and to challenge themselves in their writing.

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The application for this year’s mentorship program consists of four parts: three Application Essays, a Writing Sample, an Optional Academic Transcript, and an Optional Additional Information Section.

Please click here to view the Application Essays template for application to the 2023 Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program. Please note that you must respond to all three questions for your application to be considered. We encourage you to double space your responses and include a page break between them, making sure to also include the full question to which you are responding above each answer. (P.S. We find that conventional fonts like Times New Roman, Arial, or Garamond often work best!)

Click here to access the Adroit Mentorship 2023 Application Essay Template.

Students who wish to apply to multiple genres may do so by utilizing both the First Choice and Second Choice options in the mentorship application form linked below. Important: If you wish to apply to more than one genre, please include two complete writing samples in one file, one for each genre, with your second-choice genre following the first.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW OUR 2023 MENTORSHIP INFO BOOKLET!

Please find our summer mentorship FAQ in full here. Please direct additional questions to adroitmentorship@gmail.com.

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Previous Cohorts

Class of 2021

Director: John Allen Taylor

Admission Screeners: Lukas Bacho, Emory Brinson, Adelina Rose Gowans, Yasmeen Khan, Ollie Kim Dupuy, Luz Manuñga, Jackson Neal, Ernest Ogunyemi, Katherine Vandermel, and Jieyan Wang.

Click here to learn more about our 2021 mentors.

Mentees: Dua Aasim, Oyinloluwa Aderibigbe, Aminah Aliu, Sophie App-Singer, Megan Balents, Ashley Bao, Dana Blatte, Jewel Cao, Sara Carmichael, Ashley Choi, Melody Choi, Jonathan Chu, Noa Covo, R.C. Davis, Blair Enright, Neva Ensminger, Ai Li Feng, Jordyn Flaherty, Jacob Franklin, Cynthia Gan, Zoe Goldstein, Dhwanee Goyal, Kevin Gu, Camryn Hambrick, Samantha Hsiung, Jenny Hu, Corine Huang, Yong-Yu Huang, Myra Kamal, Tyler Kellogg, Elane Kim, Jessica Kim, Tyler King, Ariana Lee, Stella Lei, Janet (Jay) Li, Lauren Lisk, Amy Liu, Danju Zoe Liu, Samantha Liu, Sophia Liu, Zizheng Liu, Fabiana Loria, Tinashe Manguwa, Bryan McNeal, Zara Meadows, Divya Mehrish, Christina Miles, Ida Mobini, Sylvia Nica, Tess O’Brien, Aiko Offner, Chinonye Omeirondi, Katherine Oung, Katriona Page, Zoe Reay-Ellers, Deja Robinson, Isabella Santoni, Alex Sayette, Poem Schway, Remi Seamon, Ella Sohn, Yejin Suh, Esther Sun, Riley Tao, Alexa Theofanidis, Elisa Troncoso-Cabello, Julie von Bahr, Sunny Vuong, Yash Wadwekar, Robin Wang, Rachael Lin Wheeler, Allison Wong, Claire Yang, Sarah Yang, Sophie Young, Iris Yu, Aaron Zhang, Aileen Zhao, Ran Zhao, William Zhou, and Serrina Zou.

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Class of 2020

Co-Directors: Peter LaBerge & John Allen Taylor.

Student Assistants: Taylor Fang & Krystal Yang.

Click here to learn more about our 2020 mentors.

Mentees: Margaret Balich, Brynn Beatty, Rachel Brooks, Christian Butterfield, Alice Cai, Lucy Cai, Alison Cao, Annie Cao, Spencer Chang, Adya Chatterjee, Jennifer Chiu, Annie Davison, Lane Devers, Kaya Dierks, Madelyn Dietz, Julia Do, Amour Ellis, Aanika Eragam, Sandhya Ganesan, Manasi Garg, Aran Glynn, Liv Goldreich, Adelina Rose Gowans, Katie Grierson, Dedeepya Guthikonda, May Hathaway, Jonah Henry, Charlotte Hughes, Annika Inampudi, Shriranjani Iyengar, Lyra Jannetta, Cassandra Kesig, Zain Ul Abidin Khan Alizai, Dohyun Kim, Sophie Kim, Irma Kiss-Barath, Divyasri Krishnan, Anne Kwok, Bianca Denise Layog, Jimin Alice Lee, Youngseo Lee, William Leggat, Corinne Leong, Stella Li, Sophie Main, Luz Mañunga, Aria Miao, Emma Miao, Sofia Miller, Sarah Fathima Mohammed, Marjan Naderi, Charlotte Newman, Semilore Ola, Edith Patterson, Luisa Peñaflor, Lana Perice, Tre Poole, Em Power, Isabel Prioleau, Gayatri Rajan, Sophia Ramirez, Laya Reddy, Lauren Rooney, Jenny Shi, Elizabeth Shorkey, Alejandro Sigui, Olivia Sisson, Vivien Song, Sarah Street, Cobin Szymanski, Elyse Thomas, Jonathan Truong, Sakshi Umrotkar, Katherine Vandermel, Shreya Vikram, Nora Wagner, Amy Wang, Kexin Wang, Layla Wheelon, J. Xiang, Lily Yanagimoto, Amy Zhou, Frank Zhou, and Sophie Zhu.

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Class of 2019

Co-Directors: Carly Joy Miller & John Allen Taylor.

Student Assistants: Polina Solovyeva & Emily Tian.

Click here to learn more about our 2019 mentors & team.

Mentees: Claire Ahn, Aidan Aragon, Lukas Bacho, Kelsie Bennett, Maya Berardi, Elliot Bradley, Sage Braziel, Emory Brinson, Aluna Brogdon, Adina Cazacu-De Luca, Ana Chen, Daniel Chen, Sarah Chen, Isabella Cho, Audrey Chong, Annika Clark, Alex Clifford, Leo Cox, Jude Ehmka, Kendra Gilbert, Hannah Han, Catherine Ji, Lara Katz, Yasmeen Khan, Felix Killingsworth, Sarah Lao, Sylvan Lebrun, Jeffrey Liao, Emily Liu, Cynthia Lu, Katie Lu, Kaja Lucas, Tasneem Maher, Duy Quang Mai, Frances McKittrick, Uma Menon, Ernest O. Ogunyemi, Fiyinfoluwa Oladipo, Ottavia Paluch, Annamiciah Pendarvis, Meena Rakasi, Abby Richards, Mya Rigoli, Grace Song, Tuesday Sweeney, Yvanna Vien Tica, Patrick Tong, Ari Vishin, Jieyan Wang, Lydia Wei, Hana Widerman, Cindy Xin, Krystal Yang, Ann Zhang, Sophia Zhao, and Cynthia Zhou.

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Class of 2018

Co-Directors: Peter LaBerge & Carly Joy Miller.

Click here to learn more about our 2018 mentors.

Mentees: Darius Atefat-Peckham, Emma Banks, Tom Bosworth, Leah Boyd, Eliza Browning, Bailey Bujnosek, Adriana Carter, Stephanie Chang, Amelia Chen, Emily Chen, Sandra Chen, Haley Chung, Ana Maria Cornejo Silva, Kateri David, Olivia Dupuy, Quinn Filler, Dominy Gallo, Jocelyn Gao, Victoria Gong, Maria Gray, Amal Haddad, Evan Hochstein, Sabine Holzman, Olivia Hu, Bessie Huang, Kaylee Jeong, Jocelyn Leuenberger, Qingying (Susan) Li, Juliet Lubwama, Megan Lunny, Grace Lytle, Solomon Mussing, Jackson Neal, Linh Nguyen, Elise Ofilada, Harper Oreck, Sophie Paquette, Alexandria Quigley, Maya Salameh, Andrea Salvador, Maia Siegel, Cindy Song, Derek Song, Greta Timmins, Nikki Velletri, Priyanka Voruganti, Anna Wang, Grace Wang, Judy Xie, Jessica Xu, and Gabrielle Zhu.

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Class of 2017

Director: Carly Joy Miller.

Click here to learn more about our 2017 mentors.

Mentees: Isabella Alvarez, Fareena Arefeen, Tess Becket, Matilda Berke, Rudrakshi Bhattacharjee, Stella Binion, Margaret Blackburn, Bronwen Brenner, Anna Butcher, Yiwei Chai, Katie Chen, Steven Chung, Grace Coberly, Lyrik Courtney, Uma Dwivedi, Annie Fan, Taylor Fang, Sarah Feng, Lily Goldberg, Justin Han, Yuri Han, Vincent Hao, Jacqueline He, Mai Hoang, Caldwell Gregg Holden, Lilly Hunt, Kara Jackson, Heather Jensen, Isabella Jiang, Nadia Jo, Masfi Khan, Audrey Kim, Heather Yenna Kim, Katherine Kim, Ananya Kumar-Banerjee, Ezra Lebovitz, Eunice Lee, Shereen Lee, Julia Lee-Papastavros, Morgan Levine, Enshia Li, Isabella Li, Serena Lin, Margaret Lu, Vivian Lu, Erin O’Malley, Rebecca Oet, Andrew Rickert, Tessa Rudolph, Emily Schultz, Vidhima Shetty, Ashira Shirali, Tarik Shwaish, Sahara Sidi, Griffin Somaratne, Rachel Sucher, Emily Tian, Stephanie Tom, Amelia Van Donsel, Valerie Wu, AnQi Yu, Zuyi Zhao, Nicole Zhen, Adam Zhou, and Joyce Zhou.

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Class of 2016

Co-Directors: Peter LaBerge & Douglas Ray.

Mentorship Correspondent: Frani O’Toole.

Click here to learn more about our 2016 mentors.

Mentees: Olivia Alger, Sophie Allen, Margot Armbruster, Nikita Bastin, Anjali Berdia, Caroline Bernstein, Daniel Blokh, Annabel Brazaitis, Emma Camp, Annie Castillo, Letitia Chan, Michelle Chen, Emma Choi, Jisoo Choi, Annabelle Crowe, Helli Fang, Joseph Felkers, Kindall Gant, Michel Ge, Samuel Gee, Reuben Gelley Newman, Farah Ghafoor, Julia Gourary, Jaclyn Grimm, Alexandra Gulden, Jordan Harper, Rachana Hegde, Angelo Hernandez-Sias, Cassandra Hsiao, Eileen Huang, Jimin Kang, Alexandra Karaim, Lilly Keefe-Powers, Elizabeth Kim, Tomas Kontakevich, Anthony Lagana, Elizabeth Lemieux, Rachel Litchman, Katherine Liu, Patricia Liu, Kaley Mamo, Alyssa Mazzoli, Rhiannon McGavin, Noel Peng, Anika Prakash, Joey Reisberg, Jae Haeng Rhee, Josh Schlachter, Nicole Seah, Polina Solovyeva, Scott Stevens, Eliana Swerdlow, Kwan Ann Tan, Selin Turkyilmaz, Jordan Villegas, Alisa Wadsworth, Rona Wang, Alisha Yi, Emily Yin, Charity Young, Margaret Zhang, Lily Zhou, and Lisa Zou.

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Class of 2015

Director: Peter LaBerge.

Click here to learn more about our 2015 mentors.

Mentees: Nathan Blansett, Gabriel Braunstein, Walker Caplan, Carissa Chen, Catherine Cheng, Jordan Cutler-Tietjen, Maya Eashwaran, Sophie Evans, Griffin Blue Fay, Maeve Flaherty, Talia Flores, Aidan Forster, Andrea Giugni, Ava Goga, Alex Greenberg, Kathryn Hargett, Anastasia Hutnick, Christina Im, Safwan Khatib, Anna Kramer, Michal Leibowitz, Jane Levy, Brianna McNish, Abigail Minard, Meghana Mysore, Taylor Petty, Ben Read, Brynne Rebele-Henry, Elena Sénéchal-Becker, Shannon Sommers, Jane Song, Caroline Tsai, Jamie Uy, Smriti Verma, Lucy Wainger, Eli Winter, Trudy Wrona, Carrie Zhang, Emily Zhang, Jessica Zhang, Audrey Zhao, and Emily Zhao.

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Class of 2014

Director: Peter LaBerge.

Mentors: Elizabeth Ballou, Alexa Derman, Katherine Frain, Kaitlin Jennrich, Caleb Kaiser, Peter LaBerge, and Talin Tahajian.

Mentees: Rebecca Alifimoff, Ethan Aronson, Adelina Ceretto, Lindsay Emi, Robert Esposito, Charlotte Goddu, Eden Arielle Gordon, Erica Guo, Caroline Harris, Maddie Kim, Jessica Li, Erica Lin, Emma Lister, Helene Lovett, Emily Mack, Alyssa Mulé, Meredith Prochaska, Christina Qiu, Lucy Silbaugh, Jasmine Simms, Audrey Spensley, Lily Spiro, Oriana Tang, Sarah Tran, and Daniel Warner.

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Class of 2013

Founder & Director: Peter LaBerge.

Mentors: Sarah Fletcher, Caleb Kaiser, Peter LaBerge, and Emma Townley-Smith.

Mentees: Julia Allen, Samantha Ardoin, Yasmin Belkhyr, Samantha Berkefeld, Rachel Bunting, Emily Burns, Brittany Clark, Sarah Craig, Flora de Falbe, Lauren Finkle, Katherine Frain, Miles Hewitt, Lily Kerfoot, Alicia Lai, Owen Lucas, Jane Loechler, Molly McGinnis, Reiss McGuinness, Bridget Menasche, Jacob Oet, Amanda Prager, Christina Qiu, Abigail Schott-Rosenfield, Amanda Silberling, Sarah Stanton, Talin Tahajian, Lucy Wainger, and Shelley Whitaker.