Exeter LitFest To Host Arts in Action Poets from Exeter High School

EXETER__The Exeter LitFest will host Arts in Action: Celebrating Poetic Possibilities during this year’s festival on April 1 in the Exeter Town Hall.

Arts in Action is a school to community partnership between Exeter High School and various community members and groups. The Exeter LitFest event will feature teachers Dennis Magliozzi and Kristina Peterson, along with Exeter High School students. During the Exeter LitFest, guests will be able to listen to a selection of high school students share their slam and spoken word poetry.

The project is in its third year and has been part of the freshman English classes that Magliozzi and Peterson work with.

The unit is broken into three phases beginning with a slam poetry unit looks at contemporary slam and spoken word poets who have poems that comment on the central themes of To Kill a Mockingbird.

“Students write their own slam and spoken word poetry as a part of this experience and some are chosen by their classes to present their work in our annual Slam Free and Fly poetry night,” Magliozzi explained.

In the second unit, students read To Kill a Mockingbird with a focus on Lee's central themes of prejudice, and Atticus' attempt to battle against a central prejudice, racism, in the book. “We discuss Atticus' attempt to affect change in his community, and finish the book by asking students, "What change do you want to see in the world,”’ Magliozzi said.

From there, that central question leads to a research project where students write an editorial piece for the NYT Writing Contest and either inform or persuade readers about a cause important to them. For the past three years, this research project has coincided with the Social Studies unit on the Reformation.

“To finish, now that our students are informed about their topic of choice, we asked them to put their research into action,” Magliozzi said. “This can include anything from creating informative websites, to TED talks like speeches in class to their peers, to creating podcasts, to actual community outreach through the classroom or the school's ELO coordinator.”

The initiative has included working with a variety of organizations from the NH State Council of the Arts to Creative Guts to Exeter’s Racial Unity Team and the Creative Mornings Portsmouth chapter.

“The various local artists we have worked with in the past have come in to support our student's work,” Magliozzi said. “We've had musicians who have assisted students in the creation of their own music. We have worked with Creative Guts to help students create their own podcasts. Journalists have assisted students in writing their own news articles to inform a broader public audience.”

Exeter LitFest 2023 will take place on Saturday, April 1st and feature New York Times bestselling author Rabia Chaudry as the keynote author. The literary weekend will kick off on Friday, March 31st with Exeter Goes Gatsby, a speakeasy themed fundraiser that will be held at Mila in Exeter.

Held for the first time in 2019, the Exeter LitFest is a 501C-3 non-profit organization that hosts an annual event the first weekend of April. The inaugural festival included a keynote by Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown, as well as events with Joe Hill, Brendan Dubois, and NH Teen Poet Laureate Cate Dixon.

The Exeter LitFest’s mission is “To leverage our wealth of local literary treasure, in an environmentally sustainable way, to connect both residents and tourists to the diverse literary voices and places of greater Exeter, NH for the benefit of children and adults, the local arts community, and local businesses.” For more information, visit www.exeterlitfest.com