Byron Writers Festival (ABN 94 163 348 616) (the Company, we, our and us) is committed to protecting your privacy.

The Company is bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (the Privacy Act), as well as other applicable laws protecting privacy. In some circumstances, we may undertake contractual obligations to observe additional privacy obligations. Where appropriate, the Company will handle personal information relying on the employee records exemption and the related bodies corporate exemption in the Privacy Act.

The Company may modify this Privacy Policy from time to time and if we do so, we will post any updated Privacy Policy on the byronwritersfestival.com website (the Website). We encourage you to check the Website periodically to ensure that you are aware of our current Privacy Policy. Please note also that this Privacy Policy should be read in conjunction with (and is subject to) any other privacy statement that the Company may provide to you when we collect your personal information or provide a particular program or service.

WHAT PERSONAL INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT AND WHY?

The Company collects the personal information we need to produce our programs, conduct related activities and operations, involve the community in Company programs and activities and promote and seek support for our Company.

The following are the main purposes for which personal information is collected by the Company and the main types of personal information collected.

To administer tickets to events or workshops

Tickets and workshop registrations can be administered in a number of ways, including by calling our office over the phone and through electronic means such as visiting our Website. When you purchase a ticket, your information may be used to facilitate payment, provide you with your ticket, provide you with any applicable discounts, notify you in case of changes in date or time of an event, send out information about upcoming festival events and also for marketing and other research purposes by the Company. With your consent, we may collect your health or other sensitive information such as access seating requirements.

In aggregated form (that is, without identifying details) ticketing information may be shared with other arts companies and agencies for research purposes, such as to guide and assist future programming and marketing.

To communicate with our donors and supporters

We collect personal information about our current and potential donors and supporters so that we can encourage, record and acknowledge their support and communicate with them about the Company and our programs.

To operate our website

When you use the Website, you may choose to provide your name, email address or other personal details in order for us to send you ticketing or other information about the Company or its programs or other related programs or services or to respond to your queries.

As part of our general operations

The Company also collects personal information about individuals who are, or are employed by, our partners, our suppliers (including service and content providers), contractors, agents and other partners. Generally, if appropriate, we will state why we are collecting personal information when we collect it and how we plan to use it, or these things will be obvious when we collect the information.

Employees and contractors

When you apply for a job or contract with us we may collect certain information from you, from any recruitment consultant and from your previous employers and others who may be able to provide information to us to assist us in our decision on whether or not to make you an offer of employment or engage you under a contract. This Privacy Policy does not apply to acts and practices in relation to employee records of our current and former employees which are exempt from the Privacy Act.

Please note that if you provide us with personal information about third parties (for example, if you buy tickets on behalf of another person) we ask that you let them know about this Privacy Policy. You should not give us any sensitive information (such as health information) about a third party or ask us to send any information to a third party (including by email) unless you are sure that you have that person’s consent to do so.

HOW DO WE USE PERSONAL INFORMATION?

When we collect personal information, we generally use it for the purposes for which it was collected, or as otherwise authorised or required by law. We may sometimes use personal information for marketing or other research or allow information in aggregated form (without identifying individuals) to be shared with other arts companies and agencies to guide and assist future programming and marketing planning.

If you have purchased tickets from us, or if you have asked to make such a purchase, we may use your information to send you material (including by email) about the Company or its programs or other related programs or services, unless you tell us not to using the contact details set out below.

If at any time you do not want us to use your personal information to send you any further information, you can always let us know by contacting our Privacy Officer through the contact details given below.

From time to time we may send you special offers and promotions from third parties. We will not disclose your personal information to those third parties. If you do not wish to receive offers from third parties please contact our Privacy Officer through the contact details given below.

DISCLOSING PERSONAL INFORMATION

For the purposes we have described, we may disclose your personal information:

• to our related bodies corporate;
• to our suppliers (including service providers such as mail houses and IT companies), contractors, agents or promoters and persons who help us to deliver programs and events, such as judges of competitions and other persons who collaborate with us to deliver our programs;
• where we partner with other organisations for an event, to those other organisations, in relation to those events;
• to anyone to whom our assets or business (or any part of it) may be transferred;
• where you have otherwise consented; or
• as otherwise required or authorised by law.

Cookies

A type of anonymous information shared between your browser and our server is a cookie. A cookie is a small text file that a server places on your hard drive to identify that subsequent requests to a site have come from the same user.

The Company may use cookies to ‘remember’ your browser between page visits. In this situation, the cookie identifies your browser, not you personally. The Company may use cookies on this web site to facilitate online transactions and develop patterns of site usage.

If for any reason you do not wish to take advantage of cookies, you may configure your browser so it does not accept them. However, this may disable or render unusable some of the features of the website.

Secure Transmissions

While Company endeavours to provide a secure Internet environment, users should note that there are inherent risks associated with transmission of information via the Internet.

Third party links

There are several places throughout the Website that may link to other websites that do not operate under this Website’s privacy practices. When you link to other websites, the Company’s privacy practices no longer apply. We encourage visitors to review each site’s privacy policy before disclosing any personally identifiable information.

Access and correction and complaints handling

If you would like to access your information or to find out what information we have about you, please contact our Privacy Officer using the contact details given below. We will respond to any such request within a reasonable period of time. When you request access, we will need to take measures to verify your identity. We will provide you with access to most personal information that we have about you, but sometimes that will not be possible, in which case we will tell you why (except to the extent it would be unreasonable for us to do so).

If you think that any personal information we hold about you is not accurate, complete or up-to-date, you may request that we correct that information by contacting our Privacy Officer. We will respond to any such request within a reasonable period of time. Although in most circumstances we will be able to correct the personal information we hold about you, in some circumstances it may not be possible for us to correct some or all of your personal information in the manner in which you have requested. Where this is the case, we will notify you and give you the reasons why (except to the extent it would be unreasonable for us to do so).

If you wish to make a complaint about the way we have handled your personal information (including if you think we have breached the Privacy Act), you may do so by contacting our Privacy Officer using the contact details set out below. If you make a complaint, please include contact details such as your name, address, telephone number and email address and clearly describe your complaint. We will respond to your complaint within a reasonable period and will endeavour to deal with your complaint in an efficient manner. If we are unable to resolve your complaint and you believe that we have breached the Privacy Act, you may wish to contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

More information

If you have any queries or would like further information about our privacy policies or practices, please contact our Privacy Officer by calling (02) 6685 5115 or by emailing [email protected] or by writing to:

Byron Writers Festival
PO Box 1846
Byron Bay, NSW 2481

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Our heartfelt thanks to our funding partners and donors for helping to nurture the next generation of readers and writers. Your support allows us to continue giving young people in regional NSW the tools that enable them to have a better start in life.

Core Funders

StoryBoard’s 2023 program is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW.

In-kind supporters

Richmond Tweed Regional Library

“The first rule of writing is there are no rules”

Dr Jesse Blackadder was an international award-winning author of fiction and served on the Byron Writers Festival board from 2011 until her death in June 2020. Jesse conceived the idea for StoryBoard in 2015, which at the time of her passing had reached over 27,000 young people.

“Jesse emanated joy and drew out the beauty and potential in everyone she met. We will miss her dearly.’’

Edwina Johnson, Director of Byron Writers Festival

StoryBoard is perhaps Jesse’s greatest legacy. She had long dreamt of running a creativity and literacy program for kids, inspired by writer Dave Eggers’ 826 Valencia project in San Francisco and the Story Factory in Sydney. 

Research shows if young people are ‘language rich’ their opportunities to flourish increase.

Jesse insisted that writing be fun. Her mantra was, “The first rule of writing is there are no rules!” In line with this, she landed on the idea of using a colourful bus to take local and visiting authors to run writing workshops in schools.

Jesse’s dream was to reach all children, not just kids who already knew they wanted to write, or who were gifted at writing – but also reluctant readers and writers. She taught a pilot program for StoryBoard out of Lismore Public Library – a class that continues to this day. 

The Jesse Blackadder Prize was created in 2020 in her memory. The annual short story prize, open to Stage 3 Primary students, is generously funded by donations made in her honour to the Jesse Blackadder Memorial Fund.

Our volunteers are our heart and soul.

They genuinely make a huge difference in the lives of the young people they interact with. Because of volunteers like you, we have the means to offer personal attention to our budding writers. This has been proven to improve students’ writing and confidence dramatically. By providing support to young people of the Northern Rivers, you’re helping improve literacy, one story at a time.

The StoryBoard Bus will take our Storyteller-in-Chief and YOU,  our volunteer tutors, directly to where you are needed. We visit schools all over the Northern Rivers, often concentrating on schools with socio-economic disadvantages. Once there, we run fun, and engaging creative writing and illustration workshops that enthrall our students. We’ve found that project-based writing gives young people ownership and strengthens their ability to express themselves. 

Every StoryBoard Volunteer must have:

• a valid and verified Working with Children Check
• an interest in creative writing and working with children
• attended a Byron Writers Festival StoryBoard volunteer orientation session 

Please register your interest by emailing [email protected]

Donate

StoryBoard is committed to getting young people excited about literature, literacy, and creativity. Words literally have the power to move young people out of disadvantage and give them the tools to create their future.

Whilst we are lucky enough to receive some grant funding to support this work, we need your help to achieve our vision of inspiring every young person in the Northern Rivers to write and tell their stories. You can change young lives right now by making a donation.

By making a tax-deductible donation, you will help:

• Primary and Secondary pupils across the Northern Rivers region engage with world-class writers and thinkers
• Students learn how to be active creators through participation in workshops
• Teachers develop their professional skills through sessions designed to build specific knowledge and skills
• Alleviate the cultural and geographic isolation experienced by regional communities with limited access to the arts

You can donate online or contact Emma on 02 6685 5115 or [email protected]

What’s included in a StoryBoard school visit?

StoryBoard has a range of exciting and varied presentations and workshops available. Most of our authors and illustrators offer schools a combination of the two. Usually, this includes a presentation for the whole school, followed by a creative writing workshop for a smaller group where students will have the opportunity to craft their own story.

Our authors and illustrators travel across the whole of the Northern Rivers region on our colourful StoryBoard bus. Due to the program’s success and high demand, we can only visit each school once per year.

How to register for a school visit

1. Browse our authors and illustrators and our selection of programs and workshops
2. Fill out the expression of interest form
3. One of the StoryBoard team will get back to you.

StoryBoard is an initiative of Byron Writers Festival, a non-profit member organisation based in Northern NSW. 

Byron Writers Festival presents a year-round program of workshops, opportunities and events, as well as the much-loved annual Festival held in August, which has run since 1995.

StoryBoard is Byron Writers Festival’s major program for reaching school aged children (5-18 years). A committee of passionate writers and teachers steer StoryBoard’s annual program with integrity, respect, creativity and adventure underpinning the program’s direction.  

Our Vision

Our vision is that StoryBoard will foster creativity and literacy in thousands of Northern NSW kids for years to come, nurturing the next generation of readers and writers - young people who are excited about literature and creative expression, and who are empowered with the tools they need to create their own futures. 

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What we do

StoryBoard runs free creative writing workshops for primary and high school students and teachers in the Northern Rivers region.

Facilitated by authors and illustrators, our student workshops are designed to improve communication and creativity, build self-confidence and improve learning and literacy outcomes. Our teacher development programs are for teachers looking to enhance their own creative writing education practices.

We reach schools throughout the region, particularly those that have socio-economic disadvantage. We also extend our reach beyond schools by collaborating with libraries, youth centres, festivals and other community partners.

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Why we do it

We are passionate about the role stories, storytelling, ideas and debate have in shaping our culture. We believe StoryBoard helps young people to reach literacy levels that support and empower them to create their own futures and thrive.

Most importantly, StoryBoard is all about exploration, imagination and having a whole lot of fun.

StoryBoard is proudly supported by the NSW Government.

StoryBoard is a travelling creative writing program fostering the next generation of readers and writers in the Northern Rivers.

Jump on board the StoryBoard express and join us on an adventure into the heart of creative expression. 

StoryBoard’s diverse and inspiring programs are FREE to schools and students across the region. We run both in and out-of-school workshops led by exceptional authors and illustrators who excite and engage students through the art of storytelling.

We’ve travelled far and wide in our bus, reaching tens of thousands of students from Kyogle in the west, Kempsey in the south and Tweed Heads in the north. 

Browse our workshops on offer below and discover some of the wildly imaginative stories written by our talented young writers.