What’s it like to learn with AWC?

Cathie is very knowledgeable and really got me thinking deeper about my manuscript and the path that it's now going in!

I enjoyed meeting all my classmates via Zoom and getting to read their incredible manuscripts whilst receiving invaluable feedback on mine. Got me to really see my manuscript through fresh eyes.

The format of the course was great and I loved the weekly Zooms. It was amazing!

Great level of feedback on the assignments, and always very timely. Bernadette was also great at engaging with questions and comments in the course chat regularly.

I enjoyed the assignments and writing activities.

For the last assignment I went back to an old short story and was able to dramatically improve it using all the skills and techniques from the course. I felt like a completely different writer by the end of five weeks.

It's a great first course to take at the start of your writing journey!

I had heard about Cathie Tasker when I was talking to a writer acquaintance. I was asking who would be a good manuscript editor for middle grade fiction and they recommended Cathie. I thought this was my best chance to get helpful feedback from someone who has worked in publishing.

Cathie is very humble. She gives you the space to be the writer and then chimes in once everyone has shared their views. That said, she knows what she thinks works and will step in to share when she has a strong opinion.

We had great camaraderie within the group and I was impressed by how skilled my fellow writers were at writing, and giving feedback. It gave me confidence that I'm on the right track.

The course was easy to follow and it was very interesting listening to Kate.

I'm now motivated to commence my journey with some aids in hand.

A great way to introduce yourself into tackling your dream to write.

AWC is a highly professional learning institute and I was attracted to a short course to explore my desire to develop my writing skills, particularly in fictional writing.

The course offers a very structured and highly supportive environment for learning. There is enough challenge and the option to extend your learning with comprehensive bonus exercises.

It was easy to listen to Nat's feedback each week. Her approach was systematic and streamlined for effective learning. Nat was affirming and consistent in her style of feedback so it was straightforward to learn from her suggestions.

I enjoyed exploring characters within the story's plot and setting. I was fascinated with the experience of inhabiting my characters as I wrote them.

As I'm now retired I really want to explore my creativity and writing looks like my strongest suit. The course has given me a taste of what it could be like to now extend myself in this area. I would love to develop a new career as a fiction writer in children's books and in writing crime and thrillers.

I'd say AWC is a highly reputable and professional institute learning with accomplished writers.

I was drawn to this course because I'm writing a story and I had a gut feel that it is suited to a middle grade audience, but I wasn't sure. Further, if my story is indeed middle grade, I want to know what that even means! And, what I should be aware of.

I have a habit of 'preparing' more than 'doing'. I was concerned that doing this course was another way for me to avoid putting words down. In the end, I believe I learnt exactly what I needed to know and I am grateful for Pamela's feedback.

Pamela is a comfort and a warm dose of encouragement through my ears. She also has a sense of fun, which shines through.

I thought Nat was great and offered great insight.

The audio lessons are very clear, to the point, and recorded very well. The point of view stuff was very helpful for me. And just knowing that it takes a lot of drafts to do something properly.

I would say it is very worthwhile and a great place to start. It is information that you probably can find anywhere in free resources, but it is better to have it neatly packaged and all in one area.

Thanks guys for an enjoyable month!

I have been looking at classes with AWC for quite a while. I'd had a particularly bad day at work as a neonatal nurse and bought a laptop on the way home from work and signed up for this course by the time I went to bed that night. I started it with plans to write a book for my nephews for Christmas.

I was concerned I would be out of my depth. I am a nurse and have never studied any literature or early childhood courses, but the course exceeded my expectations.

Cathie is a fabulous tutor. Her feedback on the assignments has been invaluable and also encouraging.

I loved all of it - both the content and the assignments.

I am writing every day since starting this course. This course has helped me to develop my ideas into stories. It has shown me the importance of show don't tell in picture book writing.

The course is well thought out and easy to complete around other life commitments. The feedback you receive during the course is invaluable for your writing progress.

It was a great experience, with a lovely bunch of people and a really experienced tutor. Thank you very much for putting it together and I’ll return to AWC writing courses in future and recommend them to others.

I enjoyed the feedback, both giving and receiving. The full manuscript feedback at the end was exceptional, and I was very lucky to have a superb reading group.

Coming into the course, I had quite a lot of chapters written, but was still completely unsure about what kind of book it was. Cathie helped me enormously on that. During the course, I've also rewritten almost every chapter, and added new ones. Interestingly, the chapters that really resonated with my final reading group were the ones I've only written since joining the course, which indicates that I'm both on the right path with the decision to make it more personal, and that my writing has really improved in recent months. Also, while I'd shared the first few chapters with quite a few people, the other chapters had never been seen by a soul. So having these really comprehensive feedback rounds has been a wonderful experience that makes the idea of this thing being published one day feel a lot more real. Finally, it's been really great practice for me to build writing (or feedback) time into every week. It almost killed me as I was working on it on the train to work and in lunch breaks, but it was just such a valuable practice that now feels part of my life.

I would say do the year long course for the discipline of a regular writing practice, the great feedback (both giving and receiving) and the professional advice. You come out a better and more disciplined writer for it, and you meet lovely people along the way.

I was so impressed with Creative Writing Stage 1. It is such a comprehensive course and it is such a lovely community to be part of. I found it very rewarding and Nat Newman is a great mentor. The audios and assignments are so valuable. Thank you AWC for giving me confidence in my writing.

Nat Newman has a lovely presence and gives a very experienced critique with gentleness and things to work on, which is very constructive. Thank you, Nat.

The audios are priceless. And the assignments were daunting but enjoyable in the end.

I feel I can now begin my manuscript on my mother's life. And will definitely do more courses in the future.

AWC is such a fun and professional writing space. Such an experienced community of writers.

Just a big thank you to all your lovely staff.

Nat was very supportive and gave great advice and critiques. She was great! Very encouraging and educational.

I enjoyed the assessments and feedback gained from them.

The course has given me confidence! Opened my eyes to the ability to share my craft with people, show people my writing and what I can gain from opening it up to people. Learning the small things that make a huge impact in writing that I was hoping to learn and expand on.

The AWC offers an accepting environment and easy flexible way of Learning. Easily understood points on how to write, great flow of themes to learn.

Thank you for giving me a reason to write and develop more of my skill and see it as a skill and bring me more confidence to share that!

This course exceeded my expectations. I now have tools for digging deeper into characters.

I was able to get unstuck with the ending of my fantasy novel, by understanding the motivations of my main character better. Awesome outcome

I was relieved to hear that you don't have to know your characters inside out before you start because I tend to get to know the characters as I go. However, having the tools to find out more about them during the story is much better.

You always learn something new when doing an AWC course, even if you think you know it. You don't know it all and the insights into crafting your work are definitely worth it.

Grammar and punctuation are areas I know I fall down in, and this course seemed to be tailor-made to help writers improve quickly.

I now know where commas belong and where to put apostrophes. Both of which I was complete rubbish at previously. The exercises helped to solidify the information being presented.

I've recommended AWC courses at almost every job I've had in the last decade or so.

Grant was great at delivering the content. He did it in a way that flowed well, spoke clearly and was very straightforward in his delivery.

I loved the workbook with the exercises, and the ease of understanding the course.

It's given me the tools to hone my content and letter writing skills. Little things, like being reminded to write to audience, made all the difference.

The course is definitely worth the investment.

I look forward to do more courses through AWC, and not just on a personal level.

Cathie is a wealth of knowledge and was happy to answer any question thrown her way. She helped me immensely. Her feedback was always constructive and easy to understand.

I most enjoyed the Zoom meetings. They were so insightful and fun. We had a really great bunch who I would not hesitate in contacting after the course has finished.

I have learnt so much! I feel more confident and I hold my own values closer too. It has made me look at myself as a writer, which I was struggling to admit before the course.

If it wasn't for AWC, I wouldn't be the confident writer that I am today. I was a procrastinator that didn't take myself seriously, doubting my own every turn. AWC has steered me in the right direction and taught me lifelong lessons that I will carry with me throughout all of my writing endeavours.

I loved it.

I really want to write but do not see myself as a creative person. I was struggling with ideas and wanted a course that might help me to tap into that.

I actually really enjoyed learning about the artists that Kate introduced us to and how art and writing are strongly connected. The same with poetry. I have not really looked much at poetry before but this course drew my attention to it and I've begun to read more of it. I've even tried writing my own Haikus!

I have leaned into my daily writing habit more, honing it to be more reflective in a positive way about the things I experience daily, rather than the often depressive, self-deprecating ramblings I was writing. This has really helped me to keep the joy and remind myself that in order to write well I need to look out to the world for inspiration not inward.

Kate's enthusiasm for writing is infectious. If you are ever in any doubt about your capacity as a writer, let Kate guide you through how to tap into the well within and around you and get ready to be amazed with what you will find.

The tutor was very engaging and was an expert on the subject. I liked the use of examples from Grant's work experience.

It was extremely useful in educating you on how to plan and execute your writing to meet the needs of the reader and engage them. It was applicable to any audience and type of writing e.g. webpage, article, report etc.

I believe this was money well spent.

I enjoyed this course as I learnt more about travel writing. The fact that it was self-paced gave me flexibility to structure my learning and allowed me to rewatch videos. I also liked the handouts - it was easy to follow.

I'm more motivated to write articles as I can see a pathway to becoming a travel writer as outlined in the course.

Enrol! You'll learn a lot.

Grant was very helpful during and outside of the sessions; he promptly attended to our doubts and listened to our comments.

I think the workbook as we followed the lessons was a good idea and I enjoyed having material to work with besides the presentation.

I am more aware of all the steps I should follow to write in a better way with a more clear and simple message.

From my personal experience, I am grateful I could take this course and I could recommend it to professionals who want to improve their English writing.

I'm in a secondment to a new position that requires a lot of business writing (briefing papers) and have not had prior experience in this area.

Grant was excellent - the right amount of professionalism, mixed in with a laid back nature. Excellent content and clearly an expert in the area.

I enjoyed the fact that it was spread across 2 days - it broke it up nicely and wasn't too overwhelming this way. Also I liked the info on apostrophes and grammar, which often get overlooked on MS Word spell/grammar check.

The course has helped me to organise thoughts, improve understanding of grammatical rules, and increase knowledge of currently available resources, such as those for checking readability.

It's worth the money and helps provide a really good guide to any type of communication required and for any audience type. Plus lots of additional tips and resources for use down the track.

It was a great course and probably the most impressed that I've been with a course in quite some time.