It's been almost two weeks since I returned from the Erie 2 BOCES School Library System trip to New York City. Honestly, I have no idea where to begin with this blog post. There were so many words that came to mind over the course of the event: excitement, exhaustion, camaraderie, and purpose, just to name a few. It's probably easiest to start at the beginning.
On the morning of Tuesday, May 29th, I departed Buffalo and arrived in NYC after a quick and uneventful flight. This was the first time I met the team I'd be working closely with over the next few days: eight area school librarians and Sue Bartle, the School Library System Director for Erie 2 BOCES. Her mantra "if it's free, it's for me" was embodied throughout this entire trip! Our mission for the week was to return to WNY with as many free books and other items to distribute to area school libraries as possible.
Our first official event took place on Tuesday evening. We met with representatives from Gale and Thornike Press regarding their school library offerings. The dinner was indescribably delicious, but the biggest takeaway was the quality of large print materials now available through the Thornike Press publishing group. When I began in school libraries, large print books were bulky and often did not include the same level of finish as a regular print book. Students who would benefit from reading large print might have felt stigmatized by having to carry around bulky, ugly books. The Thorndike samples we were able to preview are compact and visually appealing. These would be great choices to add increased accessibility to a library's collection.
School Library Journal's Day of Dialog
After a good night's sleep, I was ready for Wednesday (which promised to be a long, jam-packed day). By 8:00 AM, we were waiting in line at the NYU Kimmel Center to enter the
Day of Dialog event hosted by School Library Journal. This event was specifically geared towards school librarians. It featured a large room full of advanced reader copies (ARCs) up for grabs, author panels, networking opportunities, and even author signings.
Although I have attended many conferences, I have never been to an event quite like this! I had never grabbed such a large amount of free books (and I was soon to learn that we were just getting started with the free stuff). The author panels were particularly inspiring, as I was able to hear directly from favorite authors and was introduced to some new, fresh faces. It was amazing to learn about new titles directly from the authors, then pick up FREE copies of the books before they were even published!
In between the keynote speakers and author panels, our group's book gathering mission began! We visited the large room containing the ARCs, then made multiple trips to the van parked outdoors to package the items to be shipped back to Erie 2 BOCES. Moving this quantity of books was serious business! I was already thankful for my comfortable shoes, sturdy backpack, and multiple tote bags.
After a quick lunch, we were treated to a highly-anticipated keynote session from Angie Thomas, author of
The Hate U Give. This book, promoted highly by the organization We Need Diverse Books, is both beautifully written and powerful. Angie Thomas' keynote address packed the same forceful punch as her writing. I could have listened to her all day! It was a nice surprise to receive a signed copy of her book.
When all of the keynote speakers and author panels concluded, we spent more time gathering and packaging ARCs. The format of this event also lent itself well to networking with some of the key players in the children's publishing world. The publishers are eager to get books in the hands of young readers, so it's crucial for librarians to make these connections.
Children's Author Dinner
Our next stop on Wednesday was to the Princeton Club for the Children's Author Dinner sponsored by School Library Journal and the Book Expo. This event was specifically geared towards school librarians. The format of the event allowed for each author to speak about their books. The all-star lineup included Dhonielle Clayton, Matthew Cordell, The Fan Brothers, Alex Gino, Tahereh Mafi, and Nic Stone. As an added bonus, copies of each authors' new book was distributed to each librarian in attendance!
Harry Potter Release Party
The final event for the evening was a release party for Scholastic's new editions of the Harry Potter series. The series would include new cover illustrations by Brian Selznick, the creator of
The Invention of Hugo Cabret and other beautiful titles. I had the pleasure of hearing Mr. Selznick speak at the 2015 AASL Conference. During the Harry Potter event, I met him in the bathroom line of all places! He was as gracious in person as he was during his AASL keynote.
 |
| Meeting Brian Selznick! |
The atmosphere of the release party was very Harry Potter-esque. Even the treats served were inspired by the books! It was interesting to get a sneak peek into the new book covers and hear about Brian Selznick's process of creating them.
 |
| Mysterious ambiance at the Harry Potter event. |
 |
| Harry Potter-inspired treats! |
As 11:00 PM approached, we were back at our hotel, but the day's work was still not done. We spent some time on the sidewalk organizing our book grabs for that day. This involved constructing shipping boxes, sorting books, then packing and labeling the boxes.
 |
Packing boxes at the end of the evening.
Photo credit: Patti Lundquist |
Book Expo Day #1
Thursday, May 31st marked the first day of the
Book Expo America (BEA) event. Although there were other librarians in attendance at BEA, this is an event geared mainly to those in the publishing or book selling industries. The event was held in the Jacob Javits Center, a venue capable of housing many large-scale events simultaneously. During BEA, there were numerous author panels, special events, giveaways, and author signings.
The first day began with an adult book author panel consisting of Nick Offerman, Megan Mullally, Barbara Kingsolver, Jill Lepore, Nicholas Sparks, and Trevor Noah. Each author had a chance to discuss his/her book, and a copy of each book was made available to the attendees. Due to the diverse subject matter covered by all of these authors, this made for quite the treat. I found Barbara Kingsolver to be especially interesting. She discussed how she enjoyed learning about many different things, and being an author gave her the chance to do just that.
Once the morning author panel concluded, we got to work sweeping the room and grabbing all of the free books that other attendees had left behind. Since BEA is more of a publishing event, I noticed quickly that many of the free books were not picked up by the conference attendees. This was positive news for our team, since we were then able to take a large number of books back to the school libraries in the Erie 2 BOCES region. When we had swept the room of the remaining books, we then packed and sorted the books we would be sending home. Sue had arranged for a U-Haul van to be parked at a garage outside the venue. This made it relatively easy to get the boxes of books out of the venue and on their way back to WNY.
 |
| All of the books heading to WNY after the morning author panel. |
After the books were packed from the morning event, our group then divided up and visited the vendor area for the remainder of the day. The vendor area contained large booths from various publishing companies as well as a designated area for author signing. I tried to divide my time between visiting the publishers and waiting in lines to get books signed by authors. What was amazing about this experience was that all of the books were free! It felt great to be able to visit a handful of booths and come away with a large number of free books to take home. I had left my rolling suitcase in a checked baggage area of the venue. This helped me make multiple trips to unload my new treasures into my suitcase.
The time spent in the vendor area was a bit of a blur. It was valuable to meet with publishers to hear about new titles, and I was even able to connect with some authors who might be interested in Skyping with Iroquois students! All in all, it was a great day.
As the vendor area's activities began to wind down, I met up with other members of our team in order to pack boxes and straighten out the van. By this point in the trip, I believe we had nearly 100 boxes ready to ship back home. This meant that a large portion of our time had to be devoted to keeping our areas organized. If we didn't stay ahead of the organizational portion of this event, we would have been in trouble!
There were no evening events, so I headed with Sarah Deault (librarian at Bemus Point Elementary) to both Gato (Bobby Flay's restauarant), and Morgenstern's Ice Cream Shop. It was an excellent opportunity to relax and enjoy the city.
Book Expo Day #2
June 1st, the second and final day of Book Expo, proved to be another jam-packed day. Our day began with a breakfast and author panel, only this time the authors of children's books took the stage. Jacqueline Woodson, Dave Eggers, Yuyi Morales, Meg Medina, and Viola Davis spoke about their latest selections for children. Each of these authors made a point to highlight the power of reading and how necessary it is for children to see themselves in literature. I found myself especially inspired to seek out reading selections from each of these authors.
We then got to work clearing the room of the extra goodies left behind. The takeaways from this event included posters, tote bags, and multiple books. It took us much longer to sort and package these items than it did the previous morning. After a number of hours, the boxes were ready so it was again time to hit the vendor floor. Like the day before, I was able to collect many exciting titles that I knew the Iroquois Middle School students would enjoy back home.
Instead of spending the whole day on the vendor floor, Sue made sure that we were able to enjoy some of the ticketed events geared more towards librarians. Our lunch consisted of a children's author "speed dating" session. While we enjoyed our lunches, over a dozen children's authors visited each table to tell us about their latest books. These authors included Katherine Arden, Fred Bowen, Jennifer Swanson, Katie Yamasaki, Adam Silvera, and many more. I took lots of notes during this session so I could be sure to find other books by these authors. This event also included lots of free copies of each of the books discussed. As was now the norm for BEA, our team spent time after the event sorting and preparing the books for shipment home.
During the sorting process after the speed dating event, I was able to sneak away for the highlight of my BEA trip: a chance to meet John Lewis! A congressman, civil rights pioneer, and author, John Lewis is an iconic and inspirational American figure. It was very moving to be able to meet someone who has contributed so much to others during the course of his lifetime. I'm looking forward to reading
Run, his next graphic novel.
 |
| Meeting John Lewis at Book Expo America. |
A few hours after speed dating, we then attended an afternoon tea with members of the audiobook community. A huge fan of audioooks myself, it was interesting to get a behind the scenes view into the making of audiobooks and the types of audiobooks that authors enjoy listening to. Like all of the ticketed events, there were many books and other items that we swooped in to package and bring home.
BEA was winding down, which meant trips to the vendor area to pick up the last round of goodies. This was followed by many trips out to the van with our many boxes of books. As the van was packed and ready to go, we were able to go out to dinner as a group.
Saturday, June 2nd
BEA was over and we were scheduled to go home that day. Although there were no events on the calendar, many hours in the morning were spent organizing the final boxes to be sent home for shipment. The amount of boxes sent home to Erie 2 BOCES and our schools was overwhelming - hundreds of boxes.
 |
| One of the final shipments ready to go back to WNY. |
After some delays getting onto the plane, we were all finally home in Western New York. It was an amazing and busy few days, but well worth the time and effort for the amount of books coming back home.
After BEA
Just a few days after my return to Iroquois, the ten boxes I had earmarked for Iroquois Middle had arrived! Since the trip itself was so fast-paced, it was as though I was seeing many of these titles for the first time. There were also some eager students who happily sorted through the new books! They were especially excited to learn that many of the books that we received through BEA weren't even available to the public yet.
 |
| Ten boxes of free books from the event! |
 |
| Eighth graders eager to see all of the new selections! |
 |
| This is what ten boxes of free books looks like. |
 |
| A student was especially excited to read this book. |
Takeaways
Now that the event is over and I have had time to think, there are many things I learned from this unique experience:
1. It feels good to work hard. As a librarian, I don't normally sweat and have sore muscles from doing my job, but this event required serious physical labor! Hauling the volume of books that we did was difficult, but well worth it when I saw the smiles on my students' faces as they poured over the new selections.
2. There are extremely dedicated people that work in our Erie 2 BOCES region. Sue Bartle did an amazing job organizing this trip and has it down to a science! I know that a ton of legwork went into the planning and preparation. The other librarians on the team worked tirelessly throughout the event. It felt great to work with others on a shared goal - getting books into the hands of our students.
3. Meeting with authors and hearing their reasons for writing filled me with a renewed sense of purpose. Many times during the week authors were insisting that ALL students need to see themselves reflected in literature. Not only does this require a commitment from publishers to produce diverse books, but it also requires that librarians promote books that reflect the diverse nature of the world we live in. Reading builds empathy, as stories are a way for us all to immerse ourselves in the experiences of others...without even leaving our home! I've always believed in the power of reading, but what I learned over the course of BEA has provided me with even more tools to reach students.
