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Presentation of Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medals

On Sunday, November 27, the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia held an investiture ceremony for ten Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medals.

These medals were created through the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia’s Office to honor 5,000 exceptional Nova Scotians who have given their time and talents in service to our community. WFNS was invited to nominate 10 individuals for the honour and chose recipients based on their service to the literary arts in Nova Scotia and to our organization.

The event was held at Jampolis Cottage in Avonport, NS, home of WFNS’s new Jampolis Cottage Residency Program.

Below are the citations for the 10 exceptional people presented with the honour.

Recipient Sylvia Parris Drumond
Recipient Mike Hamm
Recipient Thomas Raddall III
  • Through her generosity and love of poetry, writer Janet Barkhouse initiated the creation of a new Nova Scotian poetry award in 2020, since named in honor of the late Maxine Tynes, to recognize the best book of poetry written by a Nova Scotia author.

  • Gavin Brimer has nurtured the Atlantic Canadian children’s literature scene by investing and growing the Ann Connor Brimer Award for Atlantic Canadian Literature, an annual book award named in honor of his late mother.

  • Sylvia Parris Drummond is the CEO of the Delmore “Buddy” Daye Learning Institute, an important partner for the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia. Her work in education and the community is rooted in core Afrocentric principles.

  • Known informally at the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia as “Madame Ambassador,” Sylvia Gunnery has played a crucial role at the Fed, by acting as a mentor, workshop instructor, author in Writer in the Schools, and president of the WFNS board. She epitomizes the spirit behind our motto: “writers helping writers.”

  • Mike Hamm and the staff at the local independently owned bookstore Bookmark made extraordinary efforts during the pandemic to keep people reading. During lockdown, the bookstore offered bicycle delivery and curbside pick-up. Writers are forever in their debt.

  • Co-manager of the independent bookstore Woozles, Suzy MacLean and her team likewise made a huge effort during the pandemic to put books in the hands of young people and to keep them reading during school closures and isolation from friends.

  • Canadian poet, ethnographer and essayist, Lorri Neilsen Glenn worked during her tenure as Writers’ Fed president to create and nurture a new prize for emerging women writers and writers of marginalized genders. Named for Elizabeth Venart, this prize will have a lasting legacy at the Writers’ Fed.

  • A former president of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, Kim Pittaway led the organization back to a state of vitality and financial stability. And she did so while heading the ground-breaking MFA in Creative Non-fiction program at the University of King’s College.

  • With his father, the late Thomas Raddall, Thomas Raddall III has nurtured and sustained an important legacy for fiction writers in Atlantic Canada through the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award, a $30,000 prize which provides “the gift of time and peace of mind.”

  • As a president of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia during the start of the lockdown in 2020, poet Matt Robinson helped the organization to adapt by pivoting online, and in so doing, allowed the WFNS to flourish and expand service to writers during an unprecedented time of change.
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Simultaneous Submissions

The Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) administers some programs (and special projects) that involve print and/or digital publication of ‘selected’ or ‘winning’ entries. In most cases, writing submitted to these programs and projects must not be previously published and must not be simultaneously under consideration for publication by another organization. Why? Because our assessment and selection processes depends on all submitted writing being available for first publication. If writing selected for publication by WFNS has already been published or is published by another organization first, copyright issues will likely make it impossible for WFNS to (re-)publish that writing.

When simultaneous submissions to a WFNS program are not permitted, it means the following:

  • You may not submit writing that has been accepted for future publication by another organization.
  • You may not submit writing that is currently being considered for publication by another organization—or for another prize that includes publication.
  • The writing submitted to WFNS may not be submitted for publication to another organization until the WFNS program results are communicated. Results will be communicated directly to you by email and often also through the public announcement of a shortlist or list of winners. Once your writing is no longer being considered for the WFNS program, you are free to submit it elsewhere.
    • If you wish to submit your entry elsewhere before WFNS program results have been announced, you must first contact WFNS to withdraw your entry. Any entry fee cannot be refunded.

Prohibitions on simultaneous submission do not apply to multiple WFNS programs. You are always permitted to submit the same unpublished writing to multiple WFNS programs (and special projects) at the same time, such as the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program, the Emerging Writers Prizes, the Jampolis Cottage Residency Program, the Message on a Bottle contest, the Nova Writes Competition, and any WFNS projects involving one-time or recurring special publications.

Recommended Experience Levels

The Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) recommends that participants in any given workshop have similar levels of creative writing and / or publication experience. This ensures that each participant gets value from the workshop⁠ and is presented with information, strategies, and skills that suit their career stage. The “Recommended experience level” section of each workshop description refers to the following definitions used by WFNS.

  • New writers: those with less than two years’ creative writing experience and/or no short-form publications (e.g., short stories, personal essays, or poems in literary magazines, journals, anthologies, or chapbooks).
  • Emerging writers: those with more than two years’ creative writing experience and/or numerous short-form publications.
  • Early-career authors: those with 1 or 2 book-length publications or the equivalent in book-length and short-form publications.
  • Established authors: those with 3 or 4 book-length publications.
  • Professional authors: those with 5 or more book-length publications.

Please keep in mind that each form of creative writing (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and writing for children and young adults) provides you with a unique set of experiences and skills, so you might consider yourself an ‘established author’ in one form but a ‘new writer’ in another.

For “intensive” and “masterclass” creative writing workshops, which provide more opportunities for peer-to-peer feedback, the recommended experience level should be followed closely.

For all other workshops, the recommended experience level is just that—a recommendation—and we encourage potential participants to follow their own judgment when registering.

If you’re uncertain of your experience level with regard to any particular workshop, please feel free to contact us at communications@writers.ns.ca