WordPlay Co-Founder and Executive Director Libby Hunter bids farewell

A message from Board Chair, Tim’m West:

Since 2012, WordPlay has provided transformational programming that has impacted thousands of students through the hard work of our staff, board, teaching artists, and broader community partners. So it’s bittersweet to process the reality that our most resilient and ambitious champion, co-founder and Executive Director Libby Hunter, will be leaving WordPlay to pursue another exciting opportunity in January. You’ll find a letter from Libby below, but first I’d like to share about how you can help honor her legacy. 

Many of you have seen our Power to the Poets end of year campaign. Unfortunately, we are falling short of expectations and are asking for your help. After a bold and successful campaign to secure and fully renovate a home for WordPlay at the 10 year mark, and concluding 2022 as our most successful programming year to date, our call now is to strengthen and accelerate community support to fuel our promise to amplify youth voices. If you have already donated, we heartily thank you! If not, you are still invited to do so! 

As current Board Chair and a long-time Board member who has seen Libby devote countless hours above and beyond, make personal sacrifices to ensure others are taken care of, and driven by an unfailing belief in the potential of our kids, the moment calls for something special. We owe it to Libby to ensure that her vision for impact is secure through the next year and beyond. To that end, in January, we will be launching a special campaign to secure Libby’s Legacy. We’ll share details on how you can get involved soon. 

Libby has written a heartfelt letter about her departure, which appears just below. As Chair of our Board, I have decided to put my energy and passion behind an organization that I was drawn to for the ways writing and storytelling enabled both my personal voice and professional future. My greatest hope for WordPlay is ensuring the sustainability to continue this transformative work for decades to come.

In hopeful solidarity,

Tim’m T. West

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From WordPlay co-founder and outgoing Executive Director, Libby Hunter:

Dear friends,

The beginning of 2023 marks a huge milestone for WordPlay, entering our second decade. It is also a time of change for an organization that has surpassed all of my expectations and been a force for good for so many members of our community.  As of January 5th, I’ll be concluding my time as Executive Director. It is a step that, on some level, I’ve known would be inevitable; that the time would come for me to transition to my next opportunity, making way for new leadership. I wholeheartedly believe that such changes carry immense potential for continued growth and evolution. And as WordPlay enters the new year, wrapping up our most successful programmatic semester yet (2,400 students!), with a newly renovated headquarters in Northside as the organization’s permanent home, it became apparent it was the right time to make such a shift. 

Beginning in late 2011, WordPlay’s founding board and initial all-volunteer staff put into words a noble and far-reaching goal: to inspire the young people that came through our doors to be lifelong learners; to spark personal discovery, honor lived experience, and learn from and with each other. 

Throughout the years that have passed since that time, this goal has been very personal for me. The learning curve of running a scrappy startup nonprofit is a steep one, to put it mildly. It is also expansively beautiful, rewarding, and has brought a sense of connection and direction I’d never experienced in previous careers. This played out in a simple refrain for me over the years: Never stop learning, and use this learning to always do better. For others, for the organization, and for our shared community. 

It is an impossible task to fully express the depth of my WordPlay experience and how proud and humbled I am to have been part of the team making so many extraordinary things happen for Cincinnati’s next generation of creative leaders, storytellers and dreamers. There are countless individuals to whom I will forever be grateful: WordPlay co-founder Elissa Yancey, mentor Tom Monaco, the incomparable, dedicated staff and Trustees of years past and present, the scores of volunteers, community partners, supporters, and families (my family!). And at the center of it all, the kids. They have been my greatest teachers, and it will be an honor to continue working with teens in my next role as the Executive Director of the Cincinnati nonprofit organization, Adventure Crew, beginning January 9th.

Sincerely yours,

Libby

Libby and WordPlay student Aysha in WordPlay's first year.