The Telling Room

10/09/2026

It’s been almost a week since we hosted our Open House in our new space, and we are so grateful to our entire Telling Room community for joining us! 🎉
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We opened up the space to friends, family, and hopeful new members to our organization. There were tons of fun writing activities, original Telling Room books for sale, and prizes to be won. Showcasing our new home on Washington Avenue was really important to us, because creating a sense of belonging to the people who make The Telling Room happen—our staff, our students, and our neighbors—is paramount to everything we do.
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We hope to be able to host more functions in the future as we settle in during the start of this program season. We have a much bigger space for programming and communing now, so be on the lookout for more events that we share!
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Visit: https://www.tellingroom.org/get-involved to explore opportunities for youth, adults, and writers in-between!
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10/08/2026

We're grateful to the folks at Mainebiz for sharing the big news about our Grow. Write. Now. campaign! We're excited to launch into our goal of raising $1 million dollars by June 30th, 2029 with over $300,000 already committed towards the campaign, thanks to the generous support of our giving community.

Get the full scoop about what this campaign means for our people and place here:

The Telling Room operated for more than 20 years from its former writing studio on Commercial Street.

10/02/2026

🏡 As we settle into our new location on Washington Avenue, The Telling Room is excited to launch the Grow. Write. Now. campaign. Our goal is to raise one million dollars by June 30th, 2029 to support The Telling Room's transition to our new home and the people who serve thousands of Maine youth annually, creating a sense of belonging while building confidence around their skills of literacy and self-expression. This three year campaign begins with over $300,000 already committed towards the one million dollar goal.⁠
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Grow. Write. Now. secures The Telling Room’s occupancy in our new space for fifteen years to come, and builds our capacity to implement our recently developed compensation philosophy, designed to ensure the organization’s financial sustainability and advance its people.⁠
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“This is a transformational time for The Telling Room,” says Executive Director Kristina Powell. “We’re leveling up, building on our foundation as a beloved organization and transitioning into an institution poised to lead in the fields of youth empowerment and arts engagement. Grow. Write. Now. elevates our ability to do this work in a space with a 50% larger footprint for programming, while making it possible for The Telling Room to attract and retain a diverse and talented team. We’re incredibly grateful to the philanthropists who have already dedicated support to The Telling Room’s exciting future, and are looking forward to welcoming more partners into our community of giving throughout the campaign.”⁠
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“The new space will offer future students a place that truly feels like their own; a place to create, write, meet other young people, and feel that their ideas and stories matter," says Telling Room Alumni Ambassador Askar Azeez. ⁠
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With a place to call home and a team that creates an empowering culture of belonging and self-expression, our students and community can reach their full potential. With your support, we can build a future where youth make themselves heard, and their communities value their voices. ⁠
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To learn more about how you can get involved, visit: https://www.tellingroom.org/grow-write-now or drop by our Open House today between 2:30pm and 6:30pm. We hope to see you there!

09/30/2026

It’s that time of year again! The Telling Room’s 2027 Statewide Writing Contest is open and invites youth from all over Maine, ages 6 - 18, to show off their writing. There are a few guidelines to submit your work to our contest, so please read them carefully and visit https://www.tellingroom.org/writing-contest for more details:⁠
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✏️ You must be a Maine resident to enter the contest⁠
✏️ You must be between the ages of 6-18⁠
✏️ Submit your piece(s) by November 15th⁠
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Entrants can submit up to 2 pieces of writing, and all genres of writing are accepted. The grand prize winner will receive a $250 cash prize, and a county winner will be selected from each of Maine's participating 16 counties. Each county winner will receive a $50 cash prize, and all winning pieces will be published in The Telling Room's Spring anthology.⁠
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Writing must be submitted between now and 11:59 p.m. on November 15th, 2026 to be considered. If we do not receive your submission in this time span, it will not be considered. ⁠
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Visit https://www.tellingroom.org/writing-contest for full submission guidelines, writing prompts, and to read last year's winning piece. We look forward to reading your writing!
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09/29/2026

Pssst... you're invited to our Open House this Friday! 🏡
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October 2nd, from 2:30pm - 6:30pm at 55 Washington Avenue, Suite 1E in Portland, Maine.⁠ Visit: https://www.tellingroom.org/upcoming-events/open-house for full event details. See you there!⁠
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09/27/2026

Join us on October 11th for this event in partnership with The Poets Corner, where authors from our 2026 anthology, RISE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF YOUTH CLIMATE WRITING AND ART, share their works, hopes, and inspirations for the future! This event is free and open to the public, and will provide a space to listen to young voices lead a discussion on the ways that climate change, art, and science intersect.

The discussion will be hosted by The Poets Corner and will be held virtually over Zoom. To register for this event and get access to the Zoom link, visit: https://www.thepoetscorner.org/events/rise-an-anthology-of-youth-climate-writing-andart

09/25/2026

Last week, one of our Young Emerging Authors, Mo Drammeh, was featured on Bangor’s News channel, WABI TV5 , to discuss their book, WHERE THE CRYPTIDS FLED. Tune in for the conversation here: https://www.wabi.tv/2026/09/14/author-mo-drammeh-discusses-where-cryptids-fled/

Mo Drammeh grew up in Bangor, Maine, where they have lived all of their life. In 2022, Mo won the Crime Flash Competition from the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance and was named among Maine Magazine's Mainers of The Year. Mo is now in their senior year at the University of Maine, and is still recognized for their incredible storytelling and world-building, even past their time spent at The Telling Room as a young author.

Stay tuned for more opportunities to hear from Mo as more events and workshops are announced on our socials!

09/23/2026

Last week, four of our ambassadors performed their poetry at the Maine Immigration Forum (MiF) 2026, hosted by Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition. It was an honor to be thought of for this event, and we couldn’t be more proud of our storytellers for sharing their experiences with so much tenacity. There was not a dry eye in the building after our writers shared their pieces, and it was a compelling moment to witness.

Our ambassadors—Sophia, Ahmednoor, Didon, and Askar (not photographed)—were once students at The Telling Room, like many of our writers who join our programs. But over the years, they have strengthened their storytelling capabilities, learned how to command a room with their words, and are now a part of our staff, extending our impact as an organization everywhere they go.

This was our second time performing at MiF, and we look forward to more opportunities to share our writer’s voices through the literary arts. If you want to learn how to get involved and see what the magic at The Telling Room is all about, visit us at our Open House on Friday, October 2nd from 2:30pm-6:30pm at our new home on 55 Washington Ave! Check out the new space and meet with Telling Room staff for a night full of fun and community. For more information, visit: https://www.tellingroom.org/upcoming-events/open-house.

And a huge thank you to Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition, MIRC members, and event speakers—Eisha Khan, Mikey Lopez, and Fatima Saidi—for everything they shared, the work that they do, and the kind words we received from this event!

09/21/2026

We’re traveling up to Presque Isle for a special world-building workshop and a reading led by two of our Young Emerging Authors, Mo Drammeh and Sophia Tyutyunnyk!

The big event happens on Saturday, October 3rd, at the Mark & Emily Turner Memorial Library (in The Library House) with the workshop taking place at 1PM, and the reading from both of our authors at 5PM. Hear from our authors whose works differ in genre between fiction and non-fiction, but emphasize the power of setting and storytelling.

Mo Drammeh will be reading from their debut novel, WHERE THE CRYPTIDS FLED, a cautionary tale that interrogates validity: who is valid, and why? Who determines what identities are wrong and right? And most of all, when you are determined to be invalid, when society has rejected you, what do you do?

Sophia Tyutyunnyk shares an excerpt from her coming-of-age memoir, CANDLE ON THE TREE, about the anxious and formative months she spent living in Ukraine during the final stages of her family’s path to legal residency in the United States.

Please join us for a day full of workshopping, interactive writing exercises, and heartfelt reading in the beautiful Presque Isle area! We will be closing out the reading with a Q&A, and copies of both Mo and Sophia’s books will be available for purchase. Learn more at: https://ow.ly/I3ts50ZPqZA

09/19/2026

You’re invited to our Open House on Friday, October 2nd, from 2:30PM - 6:30PM!

Our event will take place at our new home: 55 Washington Avenue, Suite 1E, in Portland, Maine. There will be a bunch of fun activities to immerse yourself in, as well as light refreshments and snacks.

Our new home is nestled in between our awesome neighbors, CÔNG TỬ BỘT and Fiore Home, and we feel grateful to be a part of this bustling community on Washington Ave!

One of our alumni and interns, Jules Vasquez, described our new space with yearning and excitement when she said, “The Telling Room has taught me that space can hold stories, but that stories don’t belong to one space”. Our stories will follow us wherever we go, because creating a sense of home, of belonging, and possibility is paramount to all we do.

Please join us for a special night of reintroductions and new beginnings at The Telling Room! You won’t want to miss it.