Here are a few of the school year’s events and highlights from the BLTN’s youth leadership network, BLTN NextGen. To keep up to date on NextGen events and community action work during the school year, be sure to sign up to receive the monthly BLTN Newsletter. NextGen Cross-site travel and local programming have been funded
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On May 18, NextGen members and supporters gathered to discuss safety and violence in their communities. The meeting had an air of poignancy and urgency. One of NextGen’s founding youth members from South Carolina, Na’Zae Baltimore was killed less than a month prior, in an act of senseless gun violence. After a tribute to Na’Zae,
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Once again this year, the BLTN NextGen Youth Advisory Board (YAB) led cross-network planning for the network as a whole. In March of this year, following last year’s successful cross-site virtual writing conference, “A Day in the Pandemic,” the YAB convened youth and adult participants from across the nation to write together under the theme
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BLTN NextGen Louisville members presented their Outdoor Learning and Lending spaces project at the March 2022 JusticeFest in Louisville. JusticeFest is a local event which showcases the activism of area youth and is supported by JusticeNow and the Kentucky Derby Festival. The mayor of Louisville, director of the Kentucky Derby Festival, and superintendent of Jefferson
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Jonathan, a second grader, approached the laptop where he could talk to me. He introduced himself and was excited to show me his red mask decorated with stickers. “This is my mask. I wrote my mom’s name on it because I am going to give it to her. But I heard my parents say they
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On Saturday, November 21, Lena Ashooh (NextGen – VT), Leah Sneed (NextGen – Louisville), and Faith Omosefe (NextGen – Lawrence) opened for Joy Harjo’s session at NCTE’s Annual Convention, ¡Confluencia! Lena, Leah, and Faith worked for months with Bread Loaf School of English faculty and acting ensemble member, Jonathan Fried, in a process paralleling Jonathan’s
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On February 20, 2021, the Youth Advisory Board of the BLTN Next Generation Leadership held a virtual writing retreat drawing youth and educator participants from Alaska to Kenya, with many sites in between. Our goal was to capture moments and insights from the remarkable and trying life of students and teachers during the pandemic. When
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“It was very fun writing a chapter together,” comments Kayla. “We laughed reviewing memories to build the chapter. We learned a lot about how to balance both of our voices and connect back into the larger framework of the overall book. We hope that the book will be purchased by educators and community organizations, to
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The BLTN’s youth leadership crew, BLTN NextGen, adapted quickly and meaningfully to a year without face-to-face gathering opportunities. In the early fall, our Youth Advisory Board selected its co-chairs, welcomed new members, and drew up a plan to have individual sites host virtual cross-site gatherings. Youth Advisors turned to writing and sharing together as the
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“…’Peace looks like you and me,’ remarked one writer, ‘a 15-gallery view in Zoom, people writing and sharing in virtual spaces connected through the airways and our hearts’…”
