Writing Their Way into the City Challenged with finding a unique way to incorporate the Year of the City theme into their own curriculum, Writing Department professors Peggy O’Neill and Barbara Mallonee developed a program called “Beyond Evergreen: Writing Our Way into the City,” designed to inspire students to use the art and act of writing to immerse themselves in Baltimore. Beyond Evergreen involves two main components, one of which begins on Friday, Oct. 6 with a forum featuring a panel of Baltimore writers: Fred Rasmussen, columnist and archivist for The Sun; Dan Rodricks, columnist for The Sun and co-host of WBAL Radio’s The Buzz; Laura Wexler, author, senior editor of Style magazine and organizer of The Stoop Storytelling Series; and Clarinda Harriss, award-winning poet, essayist and Professor of English at Towson University. The forum offers students the opportunity to ask local writers about Baltimore’s influence on their writing, how they conduct research about the city, and the role research plays in their writing process.  The event  is set for 3 – 5 p.m. in McManus Theater. The forum, however, serves as a kick-off for the second phase of  “Beyond Evergreen”.  First-year students enrolled in participating WR100 Effective Writing sections will spend the semester conducting research and writing about the city of Baltimore as the main focus of their coursework.  Along with O’Neill and Mallonee, fellow Writing Department professors David Belz and Andrea Leary have designed Effective Writing syllabi to complement the “Beyond Evergreen” program.  Although each professor has developed his or her own approach to the course, the requirements follow some basic guidelines.  The first assignment asked the students to reflect on an aspect of their life in their hometown, focusing on their identity and sense of self within that community.  “It’s important for the students to really know where they are coming from as they start at a new place like college,” says O’Neill.  The next step calls for students to launch their own field research in Baltimore. Students will visit cultural and historical sites in Baltimore, including the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture, the Baltimore Museum of Industry, the American Visionary Arts Museum and the B&O Railroad Museum.  “For many of the students, this will be a new way of researching, really getting out and about in the city,” notes  O’Neill.  “Later in the semester, students will conduct more in-depth, individual research into different neighborhoods which will allow them to experience a more authentic Baltimore.” A similar process and a second writers’ forum will involve students in next semester’s Effective Writing classes. As each semester concludes, students will nominate classmates’ essays for inclusion in a Loyola-published literary anthology highlighting Baltimore. O’Neill believes the goal of publication will encourage students to invest in the project, giving them a “real audience and purpose” for their work. The anthology, co-sponsored by the Year of the City Committee and the Office of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, will be given to the incoming members of the Class of 2011 next fall as a way of demonstrating how the City of Baltimore plays an essential role in the “Loyola Experience.”