After months of reaching out for community support and taking part in fundraising efforts, six young people from the The Chewstick Foundation’s Break The Chains Teen Poetry & Spokenword Club Program are making a final request to cover expenses to offset the costs to represent Bermuda at the international Brave New Voices Poetry & Spokenword Festival (www.bravenewvoices.org) in Philadelphia. In its 17th year The Brave New Voices Poetry and Spokenword Festival is a prestigious event, which has seen attendance by the likes of Aja Monet, Saul Williams, Beau Sia and many more!

The Brave New Voices Festival is an opportunity with a tremendous focus on the voice of the youth. Break The Chain’s participation is a chance to represent Bermuda internationally while providing an opportunity for growth and development for this group of Bermuda teens. This year the Break The Chains group is seeking funding in order to, officially represent Bermuda, strengthen their voices through workshops, performances and some healthy competition at the festival taking place in Philadelphia.

Education Coordinator Yesha Townsend, and The Chewstick Foundation’s Deidra-Lee Bean will steward Marquedelle Rodriguez – 18, Dascha Choudhury – 16, Hannah Smith – 16, Ashanti Stovell – 17, Rakaya Stovell – 15, Treasure Tannock – 17 and Bryn Thomas – 18 at the Brave New Voices Festival, for the opportunity to connect with a global community of young poets from around the world.

After hosting an event yesterday, Thursday, July 10th  which featured performances by Break The Chains program participants alongside poet luminary Tiffany Paynter, the Break The Chains, Education Director, Yesha Townsend and assistant Matthew Johnston, the program is still short of their goal and need your help. The Break The Chains youth and The Chewstick Foundation have been working hard in order to reach their goal and while last night’s performance was a dynamic showing of their talents it did not yield the funding necessary to send the group abroad so we are making a call to the community to help support by making a donation of any size toward making this venture possible. You can also catch a performance by the young people at Plough weekend in St. George’s outside the Book Cellar between 7:30 – 8:30 p.m.

For further information on this and additional Chewstick Foundation programs, call their office at 292-2439, email info@chewstick.org or visit www.chewstick.org.