Thanks, Children's Bookstore

I wanted to publically thank The Children's Bookstore here in Baltimore, which just donated 130 copies of Persepolis to all of my 9th grade students.

I had heard about the program - which simply allows students to receive a book for free - earlier in the school year, but was skeptical that it really worked. After a colleague applied for the program, though, I had to try; today, a kind woman left a really nice message saying they had boxes of the books ready to be picked up. I wrote up a little grant (they needed to know my unit plan, reason for teaching it, and a few other things) about a week ago and sent it in on Friday, so the turnaround was nearly immediate. I'm excited; Persepolis fits perfectly into my goals of trying to expose students to international texts, plus it works really well with our course's themes of Coming of Age and Justice. I'm also excited/nervous to be teaching my first ever graphic novel. I'm reading books like Understanding Comics and This Book Contains Graphic Language: Comics as Literature to prepare the unit. (Also, I shouldn't say this, but I'm also looking for a bootleg of the Persepolis film, with English subtitles, so I can show it to my students when we finish reading the text; I'm quite sure the DVD will not be released before the school year is over. Any ideas? I don't really know how to get bootlegs that aren't at the gas station at the corner of North Avenue and Bel-Air Road.)

Anyhow, I guess my real reason for posting this is to say that if you're looking for a cool charity that really puts books in the hands of students in Baltimore City, head over there to donate. I'm not really sure how they can afford to do it, but I plan on applying for the grant every year.

And thank you, Children's Bookstore, so much.