For the 7th year in a row, I'm running a class at UCLA Extension called Write a Novel in a Month as part of National Novel Writing Month. We have 30 participants this time. I have them register on the NaNoWriMo site and post their word count each day so I can already see that a number of them have started. Some have hit today's quota of 1667 words, and they still have a writing session in class with me tonight.
The international completion rate for NaNo is around 16% over the 13 years the challenge has been running. At UCLA Extension, our completion rate is around 84%. There's an interesting group dynamic that produces such high completion rates. People get a little competitive and it spurs them on. The cost of the class is a motivator. My cheer-leading efforts also help.
We've had several people publish novels they began in the class. We've also had some alumni of repute including James Franco (who today published his first poetry chapbook, Strongest of the Litter, with a small press I run here in Venice, California).
We're hoping for another good year. I'll check back with updates on how people are doing as the month progresses.