UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Penn State University Libraries launched its Penn State-exclusive creative writing platform today (Feb. 28), enabling anyone with an active psu.edu email address to join the site to submit, vote and comment on others’ original works. To celebrate, the Libraries’ Short Stories website is hosting its first short story competition with the theme “New Beginnings,” and winners’ works will be added to Penn State’s first set of short story dispensers on the University Park campus.
“The Libraries’ Short Stories site offers the Penn State community the opportunity to share and receive feedback on their creative fiction writing with an engaged audience of their peers,” Joseph Salem, the Libraries’ associate dean for Learning, Undergraduate Services and Commonwealth Campuses, said. “The program’s innovative platform provides a unique literary opportunity for our users, while supporting Penn State’s strategic plan thematic priority to advance the arts and humanities.”
The final phase of the Libraries’ innovative agreement with vendor Short Edition, the Penn State Libraries Short Stories site, psu.short-edition.com, allows any University student, faculty or staff member to create an account to submit short works of original fiction. Stories’ reading lengths of approximately one, three or five minutes can be uploaded in six genres. Stories are publicly visible on the website for anyone to read, although only Penn State account holders can login to offer comments and “like” or vote for contest favorites.