Goswami Action Grants Spur Filmmaking, Documenting, Acting, Presenting

May 31, 2023 by BLTN Staff

Thanks to generous donor support, each year BLTN teachers (current and former fellows) are eligible to apply for grants support BLTN-related classroom programs, projects, events, and travel. We’re pleased to profile the 2022-23 Goswami Action Grants.

Values of Home and Community: Beyond the Page at Rosemont High School

BLTN member and BLSE student Andrew Marchesani and his 11^th grade students in Sacramento, California, collaborated with Beyond the Page (BtP) for a unit addressing housing (in)security in Sacramento in conversation with Lorraine Hansberry’s play, A Raisin in the Sun.

*Images from a “Jamboard” from Beyond the Page-guided discussions in Andrew Marchesani’s class*

BtP developed curriculum that invited Mr. Marchesani and his students to use performance, physical storytelling, and personal writing to address the themes of Hansberry’s play and engage with the question: How do we value a home? Students moved beyond their individual stories and collectively determined how those individual values of home could show-up more widely in their school, community, and city. From there, students crafted actions they could take in these various communities to make individual and collective change.

– Craig Maravich, Beyond the Page Director

The following Goswami Action Grants were awarded for the 2022-23 school year.

Dr. Kayla Hostetler applied funding to support her attendance at NCTE 2022 where she presented The Tale of Two Pandemics: Culturally Relevant Pedagogy in a Blended Learning Environment.
Andrew Marchesani, as described above, collaborated with Beyond the Page to develop curriculum using Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun with a focus on housing insecurity in Sacramento, CA, where Andrew teaches.
Susan Miera (MA ’97) documented the work of the BLSE-affiliated center at Santa Fe Indian School. She used funds to pay writing center student mentor interns to interview, record, and edit a film that will serve as a resource for school-based writing centers.
Tim O’Leary (MA ’07) and Bill Rich (MA ’99 ) lead a two-day filmmaking and social justice-focused workshop at Aiken, SC, to support What’s the Story‘s (WTS) NextGen SC cohort. Goswami Action Grant funds will support NextGen youth travel for the June 16 What’s the Story? film festival at Champlain College.

Two freshmen high school students, Pearletta Calvert and Julia Perez, discover the student-run writing center at the Santa Fe Indian School in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and learn how Middlebury Bread Loaf School of English helped implement the one on their campus. By interviewing staff and students, they set up practical guidelines to help other schools create their own writing centers.

Update from 2022 Goswami Action Grants: In Spring 2022 Moira applied Goswami grant funds to a multi-year project in Morrisville, Vermont called “The Gems of Morrisville.” “Our project vision,” Donovan wrote, “is to create the opportunity for Art and English students to discover the ‘Gems of Morrisville’ by looking at the buildings and structures that have withstood time and change, from barns to our county courthouse, from private houses to churches. ” By January, 2023 Moira and students had published “Gems of Lamoille County” a booklet featuring the history of local architectural and historical “gems” with narratives of the banners’ artwork. Donovan reports that she and colleagues recently orchestrated an all high school Banner Walk through town to see the banners in their new spots.

For the Banner Walk, Moira reports, “students were given a QR code beforehand so that they could read the write ups for various banners.” She shares the following images from the celebration of work well done.