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Where Writers Grow

As we celebrate our tenth anniversary and the launch of our new website at Hillside, we find ourselves amid a fervent public debate:

What’s writing going to become? What’s going to become of writing? 

It’s hard to miss the media’s coverage of the impressive capabilities of artificial intelligence. Ads describe a future that has arrived — “Generate blog posts in one minute!” The New York Times quizzes readers: can you tell whether the author of this piece was a human or a chatbot? Understandably, classroom teachers are considering how their approaches to writing instruction will change. Must change.

What if writing, so often encountered as a problem, becomes no problem at all because it can be outsourced to a machine? 

It all depends on how you look at writing and what you want from it. 

Growth happens not by feeding data into an algorithm, but by allowing ourselves the space and time to consider specific details of experience.

At our new online home, we’re delighted to share how we look at writing and what we know it can be and mean for the writer. Reviewing our decade of up-close, individual coaching and mentoring has deepened our belief in the enduring personal growth a writer experiences in the journey between the blank page and the final draft. Such growth happens not with speed but with patience. Not through outsourcing but through insight. Not by feeding data into an algorithm but by allowing ourselves the space and time to consider specific details of experience.

At the outset, authentic writing is always an experiment, and in the coaching interactions we get to design with our clients, we have the pleasure of creating a distinctly human environment for discovery. Integral to the development of every singular, true piece of writing is the development of the writer. 

With our gratitude for the expert guidance of the web designers at Two By Sixteen and the developers at Digital Artisans, and for the colorful imagination of illustrator Carmi Grau, we invite you to learn about our practice — and to come practice with us.

Allan is Hillside’s founder and a coach.

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