BHS - Emerson Literacy Partnership | bhsemerson.groupsite.com

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Welcome to the Brookline Literacy Partnership!

**********We have changed our website!!!!**********

Please follow the link to visit our current site: http://www.brooklineliteracypartnership.com/

Every school needs a library.

The Brookline High School Emerson Literacy Partnership is a group of Brookline students committed to promoting equal opportunities for literacy where there are fewer resources. Currently we are working with the Ralph Waldo Emerson Elementary School in Roxbury to help the school to build a library.

For many students at the Emerson School, the only libraries they know of consist of three shelves of books in the corners of their classrooms. Many students don't speak English. During the after school program, students do their homework in the cafeteria.

Despite this lack of resources, Emerson students are deeply dedicated to learning. But without resources, learning English and passing standardized tests is much more challenging.

Please support our work to strengthen literacy and build a library at the Emerson School-attend the Intellijam concert on March 6.

IntelliJam!

Join us for IntelliJam! on March 6, a world music concert to benefit the Emerson School.

Check out the featured artist at our Spring 2010 benefit, Zili misik, an awesome all women's world band: http://www.zilimisik.com

An Appeal from the Project Director

Dear Friends,

Can you imagine a school without a library? I couldn't, until I visited the Emerson Elementary School in the Dudley Square neighborhood of Roxbury. I am writing to ask for your help with an important fundraising concert, the IntelliJam!, that I am organizing to support the Emerson School.

I became involved in literacy issues when I did a book drive for my Bat Mitzvah project. A few years later I helped to organize another book drive at my synagogue, this one for the Emerson School. When we delivered the books, I learned that the only books available to the students are on small classroom bookshelves, and that there are not enough books for all of the kids in the school. Many of the students at the Emerson are recent immigrants from Cape Verde, where they learned to read and write in Portuguese and spoke Creole at home. New to Boston, they are learning English as their third language and are expected to pass the MCAS. Limited access to books makes learning English much harder for the students, so the principal of the Emerson School has a dream to create a full library for her students. I was so taken with the warm environment at the Emerson and the eagerness of the kids to learn despite hardships that I decided to do more.

Through my social justice club at Brookline High, I created the BHS-Emerson Literacy Partnership to promote equal opportunities for literacy in places where there are fewer opportunities than in Brookline. Last year we did several book drives for the Emerson School.

This year we are organizing our biggest fundraising event yet to help the Emerson School carry out its dream of building a library. The IntelliJam! benefit concert will take place on Saturday, March 6 at 3pm at Brookline High School. Performers include Zili Misik, a renowned women's world music group; jazz musicians Bo Winiker and Jamie Saltman, the Emerson School Chorus, and the Brookline High School Camerata. What a great program! There will be a reception immediately following the concert.

Please join this effort and contribute or attend the concert. Your contribution will go directly toward buying books and bookshelves for the Emerson School library. It will also support literacy, reading and books; a partnership between two communities; recent immigrants to Boston; and children and their families. You'll also enjoy diverse musical groups.

Thanks,

Sarah Plovnick

See you at the IntelliJam! on Saturday, March 6 at 3pm at Brookline High!