Check it out. The National Steinbeck Center in Salinas, CA sponsors this Day of Writing every year, which pairs middle school students  with local writing coaches, to revise and polish their essays on Steinbeck’s The Red Pony. The students participating in the Day of Writing have been nominated by their teachers, from among the thousands of middle schoolers in the region  involved in this Steinbeck-based curriculum. I’m volunteering as a writing coach, and I nominated Prescott College alum, Michael Belef, (Santa Clara, CA) to be a writing coach also. Belef earned his degree in Creative Writing in 1999.  He’s happy to be involved, and will be taking a few hours’ break from his busy job as a Technical Writer at Nutanix, Inc. in San Jose. One week from today, on March 11th, after we finish helping the kids revise their essays, Michael and I plan to catch up over some appetizers in Old Town, Salinas, before he heads back to San Jose and I head back to Carmel.

http://www.steinbeck.org/pages/steinbeck-young-authors