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history

In 2017, balancing her administrative work with the promotion of her first book left poet Nicole Sealey with little time to read for pleasure. Nicole decided to challenge herself to a personal goal: read a book of poems each day for the month of August. Nicole announced her intention on social media and the challenge quickly took off, inspiring its own hashtag: #SealeyChallenge!

Since the 2023 #SealeyChallenge, Nicole Sealey has entrusted the University of Arizona’s Poetry Center with caring for this incredible month of reading poetry. The Poetry Center offers many resources for Sealey Challenge participants, including Voca, a robust digital archive of recorded poetry readings spanning more than 60 years; the podcast Poetry Centered; free teaching resources; and curated poetry playlists.