Dear Highlights Foundation Friends,
We lost two great friends recently: Clay Winters and Peter Jacobi. Both were long-time champions of the Highlights Foundation and contributed greatly to building the Highlights Foundation reputation for excellence in the quality of our teaching the craft of writing for children and young adults.
Clay Winters
Clay Winters was a long-time faculty member of the Highlights Foundation, having taught at many of the Chautauqua Writer’s Workshop summer programs. Clay was the originator of our workshop: “A Crash Course in Children’s Publishing: Everything You Need to Know About Children’s Book Publishing.” The Crash Course still exists today, and will be offered as an online course in 2020. Clay also served on the board of trustees of the Highlights Foundation for a number of years. We had the pleasure of visiting with Clay and his wife, Jill, at a luncheon in early December. You can read Clay’s obituary here.
Clay Winters and his wife Jill
Peter Jacobi
Peter Jacobi taught at the Highlights Foundation Writer’s Workshop at Chautauqua for each of its 28 years, including delivering a moving keynote speech each year. Peter’s signature workshop at the Highlights Foundation was initially called: Life in the Spotlight: Crafting Successful Public Speaking Engagements. Peter’s workshop continues today as Crafting Successful Author and Illustrator Visits where students prepare a presentation, go into the schools to give their presentation, then receive feedback on that session. In addition, Peter taught a number of courses in nonfiction, as well as participating on the faculty of our Summer Camps for many years. We had a wonderful birthday celebration for Peter at the Highlights Foundation in July 2018.
George Brown, Peter Jacobi and Patti Gauch
Named scholarship funds were established for both Clay and Peter many years ago as a way of recognizing their significant impact on the Highlights Foundation. I know the Highlights Foundation was very important to both men. If you would like to contribute a gift in their memory, you can donate here.
Our hearts go out to their families as we remember these two who made a significant contribution to children’s literature.
Sincerely,
George
George Brown, Executive Director
The Highlights Foundation
