Book Drive Social

BDS Launch!

2009-09-22T00:14:00.006-04:00

Book Drive Socialists and Socialistas--Last Sunday's Book Drive Social was a great success. We drove over 100 books, all which were donated to Mott Hall IV Middle School. And 35 lovely folks came out to enjoy music, readings, a highly pixelated screening of "Planet Earth" and even a little bit of dancing. It was good vibes all around.

And we've got the pictures to prove it! (Check out more on Facebook)

Want to hear what's happening in spring? Leave your email in the comments and we'll keep in touch!

Book Drive Social on newyorkshitty.com

2009-09-09T21:15:00.005-04:00

Thanks to Miss Heather for spreading the word about this Sunday on her blog,newyorkshitty.com. Check out her post and find out which book she's bringing to the event.

Raffle and After-Party!

2009-09-08T23:09:00.009-04:00

We've been hard at work to make sure this Sunday will be a blast and it just got better! TheMusic.FM is bringing you a free raffle, where you can win prizes like show passes and merch.

We'll also have a drink special this Sunday: $5 for a beer + whiskey shot!

And stay at the Lovin' Cup Cafe's CAMEO GALLERY for the after-party. Live music starting at 9:00 PM: Richard McGraw, Murder Mystery and Kittens Ablaze.

About Our Folks

2009-09-08T22:44:00.008-04:00

A few words about the lovely ladies and gents who will be entertaining you on September 13th:

Music:
ddpesh Since 2006, Brooklyn-based ddpesh have been churning out sleazy-sexified electro beats and rousing New York City's hipster pack onto the dance floor with their infectious DJ sets. The duo came together during high school in Youngstown, Ohio based, on their shared love of 90's hip-hop and dance music, and became fast friends. Since then, the pair have walked into residencies at Crudo and King Size and played countless gigs throughout Brooklyn and the Lower East Side. Their remixes for Kudu and Oppenheimer in 2007 and Chromeo in 2008 garnered them acclaim from both local and international media. ddpesh are currently working on new remixes and their, soon to be released, own original tracks.

Readings:
Anne Hays is the founding editor of Storyscape Journal, is a graduate of the Sarah Lawrence creative writing MFA program, and is hard at work on her first book, Staging Something Genuine, a memoir about her work as a studio portrait photographer. She lives in Brooklyn with her partner, dog, and cat.

Tess Taylor, the 2010-2011 Amy Clampitt Resident, has received writing fellowships from Amherst College, the American Antiquarian Society, the Headlands Center for the Arts, and the MacDowell Colony. Her chapbook, The Misremembered World, was published by the Poetry Society of America, and her work has appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, the Boston Review, the Harvard Review, Literary Imagination, The Times Literary Supplement, Memorious, and The New Yorker.

Caitlin Delohery is the editor of The Delicate Rhino Review. She writes short stories and long essays. It is amusing to her friends that she has recently taken up cross stitching. She will be a MacDowell fellow in the Fall.

Free Advice:
Felix Morelo is a Colombia-raised, Bronx-based artist who is quickly gaining attention for his cheeky Free Advice in Union Square, as well as for his chalk drawings and humanist-abstract paintings.

Random House Donation!

2009-08-25T16:18:00.008-04:00

Amazing news! Our friends at Random House Children's Books have jumped on board with the cause and are donating a box of books to Mott Hall IV Middle School. We give our utmost THANKS to our RH fiends for their generosity and support!!

Facebook event

2009-08-25T15:54:00.007-04:00

Check out our Facebook event and see who else will be making it on Sept. 13th.

Book Drive Social - Event Flyer!

2009-08-16T22:20:00.011-04:00

Download this flyer in PDF. Spread the word!

Featuring...

Music by Mike of TheMusic.FM and ddpesh
Writers Caitlin Delohery, Anne Hays, and Tess Taylor read from their favorite young adult literature novels
YAL (Young Adult Literature) Open Mic!
Free Advice from Felix Morelo

Admission: FREE with book, or $8. Books must be 7th-8th grade reading level and in good condition. All proceeds will go to Mott Hall IV Middle School in Ocean-Hill/Brownsville.

All on September 13th 6-8:30 PM at the CAMEO GALLERY at the Lovin' Cup Cafe.

Educating Teachers on the NYTimes

2009-08-16T20:00:00.001-04:00

The New York Times attempts to answer the question "what qualifies a teacher to teach?" in their Room for Debate section.

Event on Sunday, September 13th

2009-08-08T22:10:00.005-04:00

Book Drive Social is about the simplicity of tapping into your social communities to get work done. In this case the work is supporting the resources of classrooms in New York City. Many schools in NYC are unacceptably underfunded and underresourced, with teachers paying out of pocket for basic school supplies, like books and construction paper. Book Drive Social is a piecemeal effort to bring books to teachers and improve the quality of education for our kids.

We are piloting this concept with a fundraiser on Sunday, September 13th from 6:00pm-8:30pm at CAMEO Gallery at the Lovin' Cup Cafe in Williamsburg.

Admission will be free with a young adult literature (YAL) book or suggested donation of $8. The event will be DJed by the editor of TheMusic.FM and we'll have some emerging writers read aloud passages from their favorite YAL books.

All proceeds will be donated to Christine Casher's 7th and 8th grade English Language Arts classes in Brooklyn.

More details to come. Join us for a great time!

Where are we coming from?

2009-08-08T20:36:00.002-04:00

A few weeks ago, I read The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex, a great collection of essays published by INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence. There's a popular view that the nonprofit model is the answer to worldwide inequality and injustice, and the book pulls the curtain on this potentially false assumption.

Key points of the book:

working hard does not mean "complicated" work (e.g., mired in paperwork or RFPs)
causes are driven by passion, not careers
the revolution will not happen in 1 year, or 2

Which leads to Book Drive Social.

More on paying out of pocket

2009-08-08T16:41:00.000-04:00

Six years is forever in the Gilded Age of the Internet, but here are some older pieces on the subject of teachers paying for their classroom supplies out of their own pocket, published by the New York City Council and The New York Times.

NYC Teachers: Paying for School Supplies Out of Their Own Pockets
Teachers Dig Deeper to Fill Gap In Supplies

NYC Public Schools on NYTimes.com

2009-08-08T15:56:00.000-04:00

Earlier this week, the New York Times wrote about New York City's public schools improved performance on statewide math and reading tests.

"While statewide passing rates have risen in every grade on English and math tests, New York City’s have gone up even more. This year, 82 percent of city students passed in math and 69 percent in English, up sharply from 42 and 38 percent, respectively, in 2002.

Progress has been made across the city’s diverse neighborhoods: All five boroughs once ranked at the very bottom of counties statewide on virtually every test, but Queens and Staten Island are now among the top counties in elementary school math scores. The Bronx remains on the bottom, though in some cases its gains outstrip those of its peers, because it started so far behind." Gains on Tests in New York Schools Don’t Silence Critics

Also read: Room for Debate: What do School Tests Measure?

The articles raised some legitimate questions on the value of these testing standards and if test-driven curricula short-change students of more meaningful educations. It's hard for me to make a call on that, but I did find it interesting that neither articles explored the issue of discrepant funding and resources across boroughs and neighborhoods in New York City.

I'm not a teacher, but a number of friends teach or have grown up within NYC public schools. It's no secret that our schools are overcrowded and underfunded, with teachers often paying out of the own pocket for necessary school supplies. Or skimping on them, to the detriment of the students.