About

The San Francisco/South region consists of the city and county of San Francisco and all coastal counties south to Monterey, including San Benito and Santa Clara.  When you join the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, you are joining an international organization, with regional chapters throughout the United States and other countries.  There are three regions in the Northern CA: San Francisco/South,  North/Central and North/East Bay.  All three regions provide conferences and workshops, and invite all Northern California members to activities in any of the three regions. Almost all information you might want to know about upcoming events, regional activities, communications etc can be found at this website at www.scbwisf.org. The shared website of the Northern Central and East Bay regions is at www.scbwinorthca.org .

The Regional Advisor (RA) and Assistant Regional Advisor (ARA) are volunteer positions, which means we must fit our SCBWI obligations into the rest of our busy lives.  Amy Laughlin and Kristin Aker Howell are our Co-Regional Advisors and Naomi Kinsman is our ARA. With the help of many other volunteers, we work very hard to provide our members with a variety of interesting events and activities.

EVENTS
Below is an outline of events provided by the SF/South region.  There may also be additional events, so be sure to check the events tab above

The Golden Gate Conference and Retreat at Asilomar– held near Monterey, CA, is the big weekend-long conference sponsored by SCBWI SF/South for all regions. It is typically held the last weekend of February.  Award winning authors and illustrators, editors, and brilliantly talented local authors and illustrators make up the faculty of this popular event.  Attendance is limited and the conference generally sells out in a day or two. Registration typically opens in October.  Notification for open registration is done strictly via the Announcement List (see below) and our website.

Agent’s Day – is a full day conference giving writers and illustrators the opportunity to meet and mingle with literary agents who are looking for new clients.  The first fifty registrants will also be given the option to submit their manuscript for critique by one of these agents.  This is an excellent opportunity to market your work!  Agent’s Day will be held every other summer at the end of August.  Registration information will be available on our website at www.scbwisf.org.

Second Saturday Series– meets periodically on Saturdays between October and May.  These meetings provide the opportunity to meet other members, form critique groups, read your work aloud, and often provide a particular speaker or focus. The meetings are held at the First Congregational Church in Palo Alto. Our Saturday Series Coordinator is Ariane Erickson, and she can be reached with questions at saturdayseries@scbwisf.com.

Kittredge Retreats – are held three to four times a year throughout the region. These are working retreats where 10-20 writers and illustrators gather in a peaceful, non-distracting setting to work.  Optional evening critique groups have become a tradition at these beloved events.

LISTSERVES
Email list serves are email distribution lists for SCBWI members. When a message is posted to the list, it is sent via email to all members of the list. We currently participate in 3 lists:
The NorCal SCBWI Announcement list – is a one-way communication device on Yahoo Groups. One or two messages are sent per month from the Regional Advisors of all three Regions telling you about upcoming events.  We strongly urge you to get on this list.  Our events are very popular and receiving the announcement by email will give you a leg-up on getting registered. To join the NorCal Announcement List, please follow the directions below:
Anyone (SCBWI members and non-members)  may request membership in the NorCal SCBWI Announcement list by going to http://groups.yahoo.com and creating an ID on Yahoo Groups.  Then request membership by sending an email to:
NorCalSCBWI-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
To unsubscribe from the Announcement List, send an email to: NorCalSCBWI-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com

The Norca Chat List – is a two-way list-serve on Yahoo Groups that allows members of all three local regions to communicate with one another.  You may read postings on the web, or subscribe to individual or daily digests. You may also post your own messages for others to read. You must be an SCBWI member to join. If you are in the North Bay, East Bay or CA/Central Regions, please contact nancy@nancybarnet.com to be added to the Chat list serve.  If you are in the San Francisco South Region please contact scbwisf@mac.com to be added.

The Illustrators’ list – is another two-way chat list specifically for illustrators. Illustrators may join the main chat list by emailing nancy@nancybarnet.com.

CRITIQUE GROUPS
Critique groups are notoriously hard to track but many a manuscript has been polished and accepted for publication with the help of trusted critique group members. So how do you find and sustain a critique group? If you have questions about critique groups, or would like help forming a new group, please contact our writers critique group coordinator, JoAnne Wetzel, at joanne.wetzel@stanfordalumni.org, or our illustrators critique group coordinator, Jennifer Keller at jenkellerart@gmail.com.

Also, we have a web editor, Barbara Bell, who can be contacted at editor@scbwisf.com.

If you have suggestions of other services, events or activities you’d like offered, feel free to contact us at info@scbwisf.com. But be forewarned!  New events require new organizers.  That might be you!

Best,
Amy, Kristin and Naomi