BPL Presents: Bianca Turetsky Visit at P.S. 225
Twice a school year, our Programs and Exhibitions department partners with the branches to offer Author/Illustrator Visits to schools across Brooklyn. This year, I had the pleasure of partnering with P.S. 225 The Eileen Zaglin School, with Bianca Turetsky, author of The Time Traveling Fashionista series. Bianca had the opportunity to discuss her work with the 7th and 8th graders at P.S. 225. What I enjoyed the most about Bianca’s presentation was her interaction with the students. Instead of giving a lecture on her novels and writing process, she made it an interactive writing session…
A Tale of Two Schools: a Brooklyn-France Connection in the Aftermath of World War II
Bring Your Photo ID: Filling Gaps in the Archive
Building Virtual Friendships
One of the biggest losses for me over the course of quarantine has been my social life. There were so many people who I would see every day at school, and I had a lot of friends. However, when we weren’t able to go to school anymore, I lost contact with a lot of them and only really remained in touch with my best friends. I started to feel lonely and wished that I could make new friends. Finding ways to be social and meet people while following all COVID guidelines was difficult—but it was possible! I know it can be really daunting to interact with people over Zoom, especially when…
Revamping High School Reads
I think high school literature needs a serious update. There are the “classics” we’re always required to read—Romeo and Juliet, Lord of the Flies, Of Mice and Men—and while they’re great books that have valuable themes, they’re also so stale. They’ve been assigned on a loop to kids, and their parents, and their parents' parents. Most high schoolers can’t connect with or don’t care about Jay Gatsby and Holden Caulfield: they’re all often white, very Eurocentric, and authored by men. Anyone who has read a book published in the last five to ten years knows that there’s…