Ooof. That Was a Loooongggg Day on Campus But There Were Numerous Highlights of the Day Including a New Grant & a Few Special Guests

Fresh of the press and hearing it hear first: CWP-Fairfield received a 2026 Cornelia T. Bailey Foundation grant to enhance K-12 writers through the art of diverse texts. I wrote the grant over the summer and hoped it would stick, simply placing a YA author, James Bird, at the center of it all. As luck would have it, I taught his book Wolf Club last night and when he heard the grant came in, he surprised the students with a free author talk. It was amazing. 

I also got to spend the day with a TESOL candidate looking to fill the enormous shoes of a colleague who is retiring. She did one HECK of a job teaching translanguaging practices found in Wolf Club. The night was jam packed with knowledge and, lucky for me, I also got to go to dinner with the applicant afterwards. It made for a very long day, but all good was on our side (although now I want to spend a few weeks processing what she taught us in relation to choosing James Bird's book. 

At one point she had us draw what we thought multilingualism looks like, so I drew Triangle Man, Oblong Man, Squarehead, and Octagon Boy. Each of the adults are talking at the boy in a language he doesn't understand (seeing all as adult talk sent from the district). Each of the characters are speaking a made up language native to their ways of knowing the world. The kid, Octagon Boy, is just looking for peace. 

And I'm looking for peace, too. The day was exhausting, but enriching, so I'll be thinking about it for some time. Now, however, I need to make up for an entire day lost to a job search (or was it found in a job search). Only time will tell.