African American Read In & Write In

The National African American Read-In (AARI) is a groundbreaking effort to encourage communities to read together, centering around African American books and authors. It was established in 1990 by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English to make literacy a significant part of Black History Month. This initiative has reached more than 6 million participants around the world and we are delighted to be an NCTE host site at Chaney High School!

Quartez Harris is always a hit with our scholars and we are so honored that he is returning for our African American Read In & Write In this year! He is the Ohio Poetry Association's 2021 Poet of the Year. He is the author of We Made It To School Alive, a full-length collection of poems published by Twelve Arts Press, and Nothing, But Skin, a poetry collection published in 2014 by Writing Knights Press. We Made It to School Alive was inspired by his work as a teacher and gives voice to the experiences of the children he works with every day who deal with structural barriers, intergenerational poverty, negligence and more. He is the very first recipient of the Barbara Smith Writer-In-Residence at Twelve Literary Arts and a 2020 Baldwin House Fellow and his poetry and ideas have been featured in The Plain Dealer, Ideastream, and The City Club of Cleveland. Harris' works in progress are two picture books and a young-adult novel in verse. He is brought to us as a Title 1 Schoolwide Project thanks to the support of our Leader, our Chaney High School Principal, Tricia Mulcahy.

7:20 - 2:15 ~ Sustained silent reading of works by African American writers encouraged all day

7:20 - 1:30 ~ Select Cowboy Council members greet guests in Chaney entry area as they arrive

and escort guests to the Library for coffee/water then to their assigned classrooms

7:20 - 2:14 ~ Guest Readers will be presenting all day in the classrooms of Host Teachers

7:40 - 9:55 ~ Reading and Writing Workshop: "Luminous Sentences - Enhancing Writing through the

Use of Language" Presented by Author Quartez Harris to Chaney Writing Fellows to be held in

Room #151 (Names to be sent to staff)

10:00 - 10:50 ~ Writing Workshop "Let's Write" Presented by Author Quartez Harris to Period 4a/b

in ELA classroom #247 (Banks)

10:55 -11:40 ~ Writing Workshop "Let's Write" Presented by Author Quartez Harris to Period 4b/c

in ELA classroom #174 (Gruber)

11:50 - 12:30 ~ Authors Harris, Eldridge and Beasly-Martin Meet with ELA TBT in a roundtable discussion about their writing stories in Room #151 for a late Lunch with Chaney Administration. Come eat!

12:40- -1:25 ~ Book Talk : The Re- Release of We Made it to School Alive with a reading of the new

selections by Author Harris - Auditorium

1:35 - 2:15 ~ Book Talk : Readings from Bluff, the new novel in progress - Auditorium

Email: CoachMariaPappas@gmail.com

gloria.darty@youngstown.k12.oh.us

Website: www.ycsd.org

Location: Chaney High School,

South Hazelwood Avenue, Youngstown, OH, USA

Phone: 330 744 8822

Twitter: @YtownSchools