826 Valencia is opening a new center in the Mission Bay neighborhood of San Francisco. The building, just being finished now, will house dozens of families that had previously been homeless. The developers, in partnership with the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, have given 826 Valencia a first-floor space, so the families will live above, making it easy for parents and guardians to send their kids to 826 below. This has always been our goal — to make after-school enrichment as easy to access as possible. And when that after-school space is an enchanted forest populated by gnomes and elves — this is key. Check out some conceptual renderings of the new space. Art by Jaqueline Brown. - D.E.
Max Costume from Where the Wild Things Are
I have one of the original Max furry costumes used in Where the Wild Things Are, and periodically I’ve loaned it out to kids and classrooms for Halloween. This year I’m opening it up to any fourth-grade classroom in the U.S. Comment below, and my colleague Amanda Uhle will randomly pick a winner on Oct 17. We’ll send you the costume, on loan till after Halloween. We ask that you return it with at least two student-written haikus about feral-ness and/or hot soup. Note that it is already intentionally dirty. When you receive a filthy, itchy costume with bent whiskers and missing feet, it is all as intended.
-D.E.
How To Make a Place Like 826 | Youth Authors Greenhouse
Today, the people that started Louisville’s Young Authors Greenhouse began writing about the genesis of this organization. Look for it on McSweeneys.net. Maybe it illuminates how easy — well, maybe not easy, but within reach — this kind of project is. It’s a matter of will, and an optimism that obliterates all fear.
-D.E.
Now they’re opening their own brick-and-mortar writing lab in Louisville's Portland neighborhood. It’ll even have a storefront with a half-airship, half-underwater exploration theme. Long story involving quarreling twins who couldn’t decide on a theme. Here’s the blueprint. -D.E.
Young Authors Greenhouse | Louisville, Kentucky
A week or so ago I was in Louisville and got to see some truly astonishing 7th graders perform songs with Jim James, Teddy Abrams, 1200, Tyrone Cotton, Rachel Grimes and other professional musicians. The kids wrote the songs, the musicians set them to music. This all happened on a Friday morning, and there were standing ovations for every tune. Here's 1200 with a few of the students. -D.E.
This is all the work of the Young Authors Greenhouse, a new youth writing center based on the 826 Valencia model. For a year they’ve been doing great work in a school called Frederick Law Olmsted Academy South — an all-girls public middle school run by a visionary principal, Angela Allen. -D.E.
Here, Tyrone Cotton and Jim James work with students at Frederick Law Olmsted Academy South school. The students wrote lyrics, and then musicians like Jim and Tyrone set them to music. The results were extraordinary. Keep your ears peeled for Jim’s imminent release of the song he worked on with the students. And someday the story of the pink dinosaur-piano will be told. -D.E.
Here’s a picture of Adrena, Mohogne and Skylar, three Louisville students who call their group Breaking Chains. They wrote a very moving song called “Is It Friendship?” based on an experience one of the three songwriters had. Check out these lyrics. There were three groups that wrote and performed that morning, and every song was heavy. No jaunty tunes about four-square. These are serious young people. -D.E.
You forgot about me
Kicked me to the curb
Our friendship was a lesson
A lesson to be learned
I tried to stay and make it work
But we never could go back
to where we were
Isn’t friendship being there for each other?
Isn’t friendship being real to each other?
Isn’t friendship forgiving each other?
Is it friendship? Is it friendship?