Poetry By Heart is an educational initiative of The Poetry Archive, the premier online collection of poets reading their own work.

The pioneering 2012-13 Poetry By Heart competition is being sponsored by the Department of Education. We are grateful to the Rt Hon Michael Gove MP, Secretary of State for Education, for his encouragement of the project.

Poetry By Heart is working in collaboration with the Oxford University Press, a department of the University of Oxford. In order to support students participating in the competition, Oxford University Press has provided a selected number of free links to entries in the Oxford English Dictionary, the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and the American National Biography Online for the duration of the competition. OUP has also provided financial support for the Poetry By Heart website. We would particularly like to thank Rachel Goode, Judy Pearsall, Michael Proffitt, Philip Carter and Nicola Burton.

The Full English is an independent educational agency specialising in innovation for English teaching and learning.Their work includes project management, design and development of curriculum resources and research. The Full English is project managing Poetry By Heart with the Poetry Archive.

The Poetry By Heart website was designed and built by the fantastically creative team at Howoco, who understood our vision immediately and backed it with their time, energy and imagination from the project’s inception. We would particularly like to thank Susan Costello and Tim Wong, Nick Laurence, Helen Lines and Declan Tyson.

Unitas is a national charity using innovative artistic and cultural activity as a way of engaging young people in mainstream life and transforming their learning. When a young person has become detached from learning, art and other creative activities can be a powerful way of getting them back into education, training or employment. We advocate reading for pleasure and believe poetry can inspire young people to achieve great things in their life. Unitas is pleased to support the Poetry by Heart initiative by contributing to the funding of its website.

The National Portrait Gallery, London, has provided practical encouragement for the project in the form of hosting the Poetry By Heart launch, teacher days and grand final. We would like to give special thanks to Sandy Nairne, Liz Smith, Yejide Akinade and Justine McLisky.

The National Association of Writers in Education supports the development of creative writing of all genres and in all educational and community settings throughout the UK. NAWE is collaborating with Poetry By Heart to host and run six Poetry, Performance and Memory teacher days around the country.

The Poetry Society‘s mission is to advance the study, use and enjoyment of poetry. They are collaborating with Poetry By Heart to host and run three Poetry, Performance and Memory teacher days around the country.

Writing West Midlands is the literature development agency for the West Midlands. They are collaborating with Poetry By Heart to host and run the Poetry, Performance and Memory teacher day in Birmingham, with the support of Birmingham City University.

Griffin Marketing has provided the logistical support for all our mail outs and competition materials. We would like to thank Peter Griffin for his endless patience.

We would also like to thank agencies and organisations which have helped us to spread the word about Poetry By Heart specifically Teachit, AQA, UKLA, Edexcel, The Specialist Schools and Academy Trust, The English and Media Centre and NATE.