94-03-30 U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove to Teach Poetry to Elementary School Pupils Nationwide Via Satellite April 20

U.S. POET LAUREATE RITA DOVE TO TEACH POETRY
TO ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PUPILS NATIONWIDE VIA SATELLITE APRIL 20

       CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., March 30 -- Elementary school pupils throughout
the
country will have an opportunity to learn about poetry with U.S. Poet
Laureate Rita Dove
during an hour-long interactive teleconference on April 20.  The
poetry-teaching session will be
available to schools nationwide via satellite at 10:45 a.m. (EDT).
       Dove, who is Commonwealth Professor of English at the University of
Virginia, will
work with her daughter Aviva's fifth-grade class from Greer Elementary School
in
Charlottesville and, via satellite, with a fifth-grade class at Norton
Elementary School in Norton,
VA.   The session will take place in the Rotunda Dome Room at the University
of Virginia.
       Dove will also respond to questions mailed from other students around
the country
about poetry and writing poetry during the teleconference, as time permits. 
Students should
mail their questions to the Virginia Center for the Book, 11th Street at
Capitol Square,
Richmond VA 23219-3491.  Letters and postcards should be postmarked no later
than April 13. 
       Dove was appointed the nation's seventh poet laureate last year by the
Library of
Congress.  At her installation she said one of her goals was to help reclaim
"lost public ground
for serious literature" and to promote poetry as widely as possible among
Americans.
       The teleconference is sponsored by the Virginia Center for the Book
and the Virginia
State Library and Archives, with the support of the University of Virginia
and WCYB-TV in
Bristol, VA.
       Dove's poetry collections include "The Yellow House on the Corner,"
"Museum," Thomas
and Beulah" (for which she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1987) and "Grace Notes."
       For more information about the teleconference, please contact the
Virginia Center for
the Book at (804) 371-6493 or the U.Va. Television News Office at (804)
924-7550. 
       The satellite coordinates to receive the teleconference are Telestar
302, Transponder 5H,
Channel 10.
                                               ###
                                                                             
     March 29, 1994
 
       

[Submitted by: Karen A. Castle  (kac@uva.pcmail.virginia.edu)
               Wed, 30 Mar 94 10:38:58 EST]