Lake Isabella Dickens Day of Writing
Friday, February 6, 2026. Students at Kern Valley High School will have the opportunity to express their creativity by participating in the 4th Cleveland Dickens Day of Writing. Students will meet together, where they will read the opening of Bleak House and write a creative or analytical essay connecting it to social issues in their community.
Schedule
8:30-8:45 – Welcome, Orientation, and Snacks
8:45-9:45 – Bleak House Group Readthrough
9:45-10:30 – Guest Lecture
10:30-10:45 – Break
10:45-11:45 – Initial Draft Writing
11:45-12:30 – Continue Draft Writing / Bleak House Art Project Time
12:30-12:45 – Preliminary Mentor Video Chat Recordings
12:45-1:30 – Lunch
1:30-2:30 – Dickens Storytime
2:30 – 3:25 – Ballroom Dancing (Sir Roger De Coverley)
3:25-3:30 – Wrap-Up
Lake Isabella
Other Locations
Support for this event comes from Julie Minnis, The Friends of the Dickens Project, The Jordan-Stern Presidential Chair for Dickens and Nineteenth-Century Studies, The Humanities Institute, David A. Perdue and The Charles Dickens Page, The Charles Dickens Museum, and the many Dickens Project High School and Teacher Scholarship donors.