By Lookout Staff

March 9, 2022 -- Santa Monica College (SMC) Emeritus students will share stories and poems from the latest edition of "The Emeritus Chronicles" during a live virtual reading this month.

The reading will be held via Zoom on Monday, March 21 from 5 to 6:30 p.m. A link at smc.edu/emeritus-events takes guests directly to the online event.

"The Emeritus Chronicles is an opportunity to feel the emotions of Emeritus students through their poems, stories, and other creative works," said Dr. Scott Silverman, Dean of Noncredit and External Programs.

"It is always meaningful to hear and read from their lived experiences," Silverman said of the students enrolled in SMC's noncredit program for older adults.

Silverman and SMC Emeritus creative writing instructor Monona Wali will host the reading by students in the “Writing for Publication” class, college officials said.

Over the course of ten weeks, students peer-reviewed each other’s work, edited and proofread it, Wali said. They also gained first-hand knowledge of what it takes to put a journal together.

"The reader who goes from one piece to the next will not only see the writer, they will no doubt recognize themself as if looking in a mirror," Wali said.

"So much of what delights, saddens, angers, or mystifies us is held as if in a common trust," she said.

"The age of Zoom" hasn't changed the "feel" of "Chronicles," which is marking its 31st edition, Wali said.

"For the five years I’ve been editing it, Chronicles has been just that, a chronicle of the way we live and think and remember now, in this moment," Wali said.

"If stories have been impacted by the pandemic, or by climate change, or the political atmosphere, they are still rooted in all that took place before in the writer’s life.

"Each story, though unique in its details, speaks to our common humanity. That’s the power of a good story or poem," she said.

Copies of Emeritus Chronicles will sold -- while supplies last -- through the Emeritus Chronicles link at smc.edu/emeritus-events. The cost is $10 per copy.

Founded in 1975, Emeritus offers more than 120 noncredit adult education classes and special programs that serve more than 3,000 students each year.