Sarah Ellis Bates is a writer, designer, & educator living in Orlando, Florida. She is the Youth Outreach Coordinator for the Orange County Library System, where she works to further develop community partnerships and opportunities. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) from George Mason University and was the 2016-17 MFA Thesis Fellow for fiction.
She writes fiction as Ellis Bates and is working on her first novel, The Left & the Leaving. She documents the process at Discovering Althea.
Sarah is the former Director of Programs for the Deep Center, a literacy nonprofit in Savannah, Georgia. As DP, Sarah was responsible for the success of all Deep programs, including the Young Author Project, which was named one of 50 finalists for the National Arts & Humanities Youth Program Award in 2013 & 2014.
You can find Sarah on most social media platforms as @heybates.
I went to the Deep website; totally cool! I am an elementary teacher and would love it if we had something like this in my area :) Better, still, would like to teach there!
That’s awesome! And thanks for liking our Facebook page. I love working for Deep, and have spent the last few years specifically working with out elementary kids and working on our elementary curriculum book. Working for Deep makes my heart so full. <3 We are gearing up to release TEN new books of student work from the spring semester–we are pumped! Thanks for the support, and maybe one day Deep WILL be in your area! (Also, check out thatwritinglady.com. It's our Executive Director's blog. You can also see our curriculum book there!)
Sounds great! If you ever want to know anything or need a teacher’s input, feel free to ask :)