Villiers Park-Creative Writing

Yo guys! I'm going to the Villiers Park course on Saturday the 15th of June and I was wondering if anyone else is going because it would be pretty sweet to talk to you here first because I am unfortunately a bit socially inept lol

This is an old post but I've applied for the same course this year, and I was wondering what your experience was like? Also I freaked out for a minute because I thought you posted it this year and I was wondering why I didn't get an email from them!🙄😂

Hi!
The residential was really good actually! I'm glad I went in the end, though it's a bit awkward at first and I didn't really make friends until near the end (but that's just me). The people though were really friendly, and there was mix of boys and girls, though obviously if you share a room (which I did) you will share with a person of your own gender to avoid 'sookie sookie' if you catch my drift but if you into that I'm sure there'll be ample opportunity lool
Generally, we spent most of the time in 'seminars', and sharing our written work, that they set us, with other people. I also showed some of my previous writing from a novel I'm doing to the main lecturer dude, so if you want you can bring that. They actually set us homework though, which was kinda crap seeing as we finished at like 8, but it was managable.
On the last day, we went to Cambridge, and got a subway lol because they gave us five pounds each! Mine was only £3 so I got £2 to keep lol sneaky
While we were there we saw a play that had Molly from Sherlock in it?!?!
The food was really nice though some advice there's a bowl of chocolates when you first arrive TAKE SOME AND SAVE THEM as they don't do it again and it might be good to have as a snack I regret that so much lol
Hope that's helpful give us a bell if you have any more questions and good luck!

I wasn't expecting a reply that fast!!😀 Thanks this is so informative! I really hope I get a place now, + the fact that you got to see Louise Brealey live😮 Was it Husbands + Sons you saw? I hope there's a chance to see live theatre this time. A couple more questions - how soon after the deadline did you find out you got a place? And how much sharing of your own writing did you have to do? I know it sounds a little ridiculous because I signed up to a creative writing course, but I find my writing to be quite personal + I worry about the judgements of others.

LOL it's ok just good timing I guess The play we went to see was 'Constellations' and it was pretty good! I'm sure you'll get to see something similiar when you go.
When it came to applying, my english teacher actually came up to me and asked if I was interested in going; I had never even heard of Villiers Park before! My school is a pretty good grammar which sends people to it every year for a variety of courses, and pays half the amount for us through this charity thing, so I had friends going for medicine, law, english lit etc.It was only because I want to be an author that they offered it to me lol. I don't want this to sound bad but because it's a grammar that sends people every year I think it was pretty much guaranteed that I would get a place as I didn't even know I had to get accepted onto it, so are you applying by yourself or through a school? I wouldn't worry about getting a place though if you think you'll get an A or A* in English because there were like 25 people on my week, and they were running weeks after and before I went so there are plenty of places.
I'm not sure really how long you'll have to wait to hear; when did you apply? I think my teacher came to me with a letter maybe at about this time last year. I'm not 100% sure though.
In relation to not wanting to share your work, I feel you on a spiritual level bruh. As someone who has been planning my books for years now, I'm EXTREMELY protective over what I write and my characters. However, with sharing, most of that which you do is crappy stuff you do when you get there like poems or whatever, because they set you tasks as homework and in seminars relating to all kinds of creative writing (like script writing or indeed poetry). Also heads up, they make you read out something of your choice at the end and record you and possibly put it on YouTube (it's just your voice though not your face).
When it comes to sharing your written work from home like bits of your book etc. the key thing to remeber is that you don't have to show anyone this; there is an opportunity to sign up for a one-to-one session with your lecturer, where you can shown them your own work if you want. You don't share it with the other pupils unless you do it at dinner or whatever. I was really nervous about showing the dude, because like I said I'm very protective and not very good at taking criticism, but in the end I thought screw it. I had never shown anyone any of it, and in the end I decided I had to get some feedback from someone who is used to dealing with this sort of situation. In the end, I came into the room and showed him, and I was so scared whilst he was reading it! When he asked me questions and I actually had to say my characters names out loud it made me feel so weird talking to someone instead of just saying it inside of my head. He actually said it was good (yay) and I had a very strong first touch (because he's always talking about editting) but he did point out I have some very long sentences which you can probably see evidence of here lol. The point I'm making is I did get some useful advice as well as encouragement, so try to overcome your embarassment and get some feedback because it is useful to bear in mind.

I got an email the other day saying I GOT IN! Yay! Thanks so much for all this information, it's so useful. Also glad to hear that someone else understands what it's like to be protective over your writing. I don't think I'm going to do the one on one thing with the lecturer though, because I haven't got any of my writing developed enough! I just have a lot of half written film and play scripts haha! Thanks again, I'm so excited to go now