On Monday, August 26, we celebrated 826′s Youth Literacy Day with the release of a special edition of the 826 Quarterly that features our best student writing from 2002 to 2012.
A mix of students, past and present, read their work published in the 826 Quarterly 17. Highlights included twenty-one-year-old former workshops student Emily Mayer reading from her story, “The Case of the Sparkly Pink Hello Kitty Pen,” originally published in 2006, and thirteen-year-old Marco Ponce reading his letter to President Obama, which was published in 2009’s Thanks and Have Fun Running the Country.
Quarterly 17 illustrator and cover artist Angela Dominguez and field trip artist Manny Silva created on-the-spot drawings for students before the event, attendees took a quiz written by Lemony Snicket to determine whether or not they themselves were Quarterly 17 authors, and we held a delicious bake sale (inspired by the quarterly story, “The President Needs $14 Trillion and Fast”).
We want to thank all the students who read and participated in the Q and A following the reading and Manny Silva and Angela Dominguez for donating their time and talent during the event. Thank you to our neighbors at Craftsman+Wolves for donating some of the baked goods at the bakesale. We are extremely thankful to Viracocha for donating their beautiful event space for us to hold the release party.
We hope to see you at our 8/26 Day celebration next year, and thank you for a wonderful eleven years so far!