Young cricketers, footballers, and even musicians get to meet and learn from more experienced practitioners of their fields, but young writers do not.

That was the word from Royal Gazette Newspapers in Education coordinator and former teacher Ron Lightbourne, the first participant in Berkeley Institute's Writers in Residence programme.

The brainchild of English and drama teacher Jaquelyn Wiley, the programme has invited local writers of prose, poetry and drama to conduct small group workshops to teach promising young writers the tricks of the trade.

Berkeley's writers in residence for 1999 are Mr. Lightbourne, Bermuda Sun deputy editor Meredith Ebbin, poet Alan Smith, poet Andra Simons, Royal Gazette reporter Kim Dismont Robinson, and education officer Shangri-La Durham Thompson.

Ms Wiley said students who had produced their own work would take part in the workshops after shining in their creative writing classes.

She added: "It is good for them to get something from someone other than their English teacher. We want younger Bermudians to see writing as being of value.'' Ms Wiley got the idea for the programme after talking with Mr. Simons after attending his Flow night at the Coconut Rock restaurant. Flow provides an open mike session for budding poets.

"The point is to get them working on something that they can complete,'' she said. "They were recommended by their English teachers.'' A total of 35 students will take part in all the workshops and last for one class period of 40 minutes.

"I think the response has been good. I don't think they quite knew what to expect,'' Ms Wiley said.

She added: "I hope the momentum built here continues. We intend to publish their work in some form.

Ms Wiley said her students were mainly writing lyric poetry which is to be expected for such a young group of people.

"It's so emotive, subjective, and personal, and very often written in the first person,'' Ms Wiley added. "When you are 15, you write about what you know.'' Tiffany Turner said she enjoyed being a part of the workshop, adding: "I enjoy writing poetry. And this helps me improve.'' Jevanie Fubler said: "I feel it was fun and something new to learn about. I thought Mr. Lightbourne was very helpful.'' His sentiments were echoed by Sarah Tucker, who added: "Yes it was fun. I liked the fact that I got to express myself and Mr. Lightbourne was very insightful.'' Mr. Lightbourne came in for high praise from Maiesha Hayward, while Steven Ferriera said he learned new tricks in writing.

He added: "I really appreciated the parts where he talked about metaphor.

With his help I feel I have improved.'' Ms Dismont Robinson -- a regular at Flow -- said she wants to open young people's horizons and get them to see themselves as writers "in their own right''.

She said: "It's important to get young people thinking about writing poetry or any form of artistic expression, in a way relevant to their lives.''