On a day in late October, senior Deloris N. called the meeting to order at 2:20pm with five members present. One by one, each announced his name and connection to writing. Soon the atmosphere changed from hesitant to relaxed as laughter rose to such levels that librarian Jean Wu was forced to warn the group about the excessive noise. The group played a writing chain game, listened to short stories written by the members, and had a discussion on writing style. Before they were ready, the time came for the meeting to end. At its conclusion, the Inky Palm writing club was officially added to Kerr's long list of extra curricular activities.

"What we’re trying to do is get together the writers of Kerr and collectively work on things," Deloris said. "Usually we have group discussions about writing and we’ll talk about, for example, what we like to write and also get together and write stories. We also try to see if they would enter [their work] into our writing club folder which will, hopefully by the end of the year, be turned into an anthology."

Though the club started officially only three months ago, Deloris has pushed the idea for an entire year. Complications with conflicting schedules and the large amount of school-wide clubs in Kerr delayed the Inky Palm's creation, but Deloris’s belief that the club would be beneficial encouraged her to overcome any obstacles.

"I thought, ‘there’s a lot of clubs in Kerr, like Speech and Debate, and there‘s journalism, but there’s not actually a club about writing stories or poems or something like that,’" Deloris said. "I was thinking maybe it’d be a neat idea if you could actually get them together and work together, and there would be a place for them to come and share their writing if they wanted to."

Inky Palm member senior Justin G. has attended nearly every meeting the club has held and sees it as a safe haven to relate his writings.

"I was attracted to [the Inky Palm] because I am a writer and it's where I belong, I belong in a writer’s club," Justin said. "I like the fact that I can share my stories and get critiques."

Junior Amy P., co-founder of the Inky Palm, said that the original idea behind the writing club has changed and the club has become something very different.

"[The concept] used to be helping people become better writers but now it's read your stuff out loud and talk about stuff, they make fun of people," Amy said. "[Even with the change] the students who go, like Justin, seem to really like it.”

While Amy and Deloris were working to start up the Inky Palm, one of their most important tasks was to find a teacher to sponsor the club. After going through the entire English department, they persuaded Jana Johnson to sponsor the club.

“I got involved with the Inky Palm because [Deloris] asked me,” Johnson said. “I would really like to see a writing club get off the ground here at Kerr, especially since the students need a forum to publish their writing. I wish there would be more student involvement; that would be the first step in making it last.”