Students, faculty and staff at Salt Lake Community College can publish their media in the Folio literary and art magazine.
The theme for this semester is “recalibrate” but submissions outside of the theme are still encouraged. Amie Schaeffer, literary editor for Folio and former editor-in-chief of The Globe, touched on the inspiration behind the theme.
“I was thinking about how much we’ve had to kind of adjust over the past 18 months,” Schaeffer said. “I thought of it as a ‘soulful’ recalibration. A recalibration of attitude, a recalibration of our soul, where some adjustments might not be good and some might be for the better. But we’ve all just kind of had to have this recalibration.”
The first edition of the magazine was first published in 1999. Since then, Folio has provided a space for the SLCC community to share their voices through different kinds of media, including poetry, literature, visual arts, photography, and video and audio.
Heather Graham, lab coordinator at the Jordan Campus Student Writing and Reading Center, has been submitting to Folio regularly since 2013. She has also had multiple roles at the magazine such as literary editor, design editor and staff, and worked at The Globe for several semesters, which included one term as editor-in-chief.
“Submitting to Folio helped me progress as a writer because it gave me a place to find my voice within the community of writers at SLCC,” Graham said. “It allowed me to see pieces [of my own] that were good ones, pieces that needed work and find ways to grow.”
SLCC is one of the most diverse public colleges in the state of Utah, and Folio is a representation of that diversity.
“Being on staff for Folio also allowed me to learn about all of these other voices and lived experiences of the people I was seeing in the classroom or in the hall,” Graham said. “And it helped me learn a lot about how writing can be a way to share history and passion as well as a call for change and representation.”
Schaeffer understands the vulnerability that comes with submissions.
“It’s a very personal thing to give over to somebody to judge,” she said. “But if you can be part of something that’s a collection, you are also somebody that’s representing that collection.”
Graham was encouraged by her English professor, Ron Christiansen, to submit her work for the first time back in 2013.
“It was so exciting to have my work published and know that other people were going to read it,” she said. “It was also super scary. Overall, it was a great experience.”
Folio accepts submissions in all artistic areas: poetry, literature, visual art, photography, and multimedia. Each person can submit up to three pieces per category. The submission deadline for the fall 2021 issue is Oct. 7.
A launch party will be held in the Student Center Copper Room at Taylorsville Redwood Campus on Dec. 6 at 6 p.m. This will also be offered virtually as a hybrid event.
For more information on Folio and how to submit a piece for the fall 2021 issue, go to slccfolio.org.
An earlier version of this article listed the wrong date for the Folio launch party.
