826LA

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826LA is a

The 826LA Board of Directors consists of Susan Ko, Sarah Rosenwald Varet, Nancy Yang, Chad DePue, Andy Alcaraz, Ben Au, Adriana Centeno, Matthew Cherniss, Dave Eggers, Jodie Evans, Scott A. Ginsburg, Eileen Shields, Belinda Tan, and Holly A. Thomas.

There are eight other

The Time Travel Mart exists at both 826LA in Mar Vista and 826LA in Echo Park, specializing in products imported from the past and future, such as Viking odorant, robot milk, robot toupees, robot emotions, mammoth chunks, and other time travel-themed oddities created in partnership with local artists. The store and its initial line of products were conceived by writers Mac Barnett and Jon Korn, and graphic designer Stefan G. Bucher. The Time Travel Mart sells a variety of books for children and adults, as well as anthologies written by 826LA writing students.

Programs

After-school tutoring

826LA offers free tutoring Monday through Thursday. Tutoring is offered with a focus on personalized instruction, offering local students individualized help with their homework. Students come to the writing labs, where they work with tutors to complete their daily assignments, and often to embark on ambitious writing projects: poems, stories, comic books, and self-initiated research. Student writing is compiled and published in chapbook form.

Workshops

826LA offers writing workshops that cover a wide spectrum of subjects, all designed to strengthen students’ skills, foster their creativity, and give them an opportunity to execute projects that showcase their work. Working professionals teach all the offered workshops, and class sizes are kept small to ensure individualized attention. These workshops focus on a variety of topics. Recent classes have covered crafting college-application essays, designing imaginary countries, preparing for the SAT, reviewing runway fashion, and writing love poetry from the perspective of leopards. In 2012, two workshops encouraged students to examine their daily lives and share their thoughts and experiences with students in Rwanda and India.

Among its many collaborative workshops is Sunday Afternoon For Kids, held at the Hammer Museum in which artists, writers and performers teach their craft.^[2]

A popular songwriting workshop brings together local musicians to collaborate with students in the songwriting process. In 2010, an edition of the workshop featured the band

826LA also sends volunteers into school throughout Los Angeles. Tutors support Los Angeles teachers in their classrooms, providing students with one-on-one attention and feedback as they work on various writing assignments: sonnets, biographies, University of California application essays, narrative essays, and more. In Spring 2006, Community Photoworks was created, an annual collaboration between 826LA and the J. Paul Getty Museum. Seventh-graders students were taught the basics of photographic composition, explored Los Angeles with cameras, and wrote and polished artist statements. Their photographs and statements were displayed in a gallery exhibition in Venice.^[5]

Field trips

In the mornings, classes from around Los Angeles visit the 826LA writing labs to participate in engaging and spirited field trips. Teachers can choose from various field-trip plans, such as workshops in screenwriting and journalism, or request a custom-designed program. Field trips are tailored to complement any teacher's curriculum.

The most popular field trip is "Storytelling & Bookmaking," in which classes collaborate to write stories for Professor Barnacle, the never-seen, always-cranky publisher behind Barnacle & Barnacle Books. With the help of several storytellers, an illustrator, and a typist, a class works together to create characters, a setting, and a plot for an original story. (A recent book chronicled the friendship between an injured mouse and a sandwich-making robot policeman. Others have featured time traveling tea-cup pigs, spaghetti monsters, and sentient planets). The action builds to a thrilling cliffhanger, and then each student has an opportunity to write an ending, create an illustration, bind his or her book, and walk away with the finished product. Barnacle is notoriously hard to please, but the students’ work manages to earn the professor's enthusiastic approval every time.

Events

Dead Author Readings

Since 2008, 826LA has presented a series of Dead Author Readings, in which deceased wordsmiths such as

826LA has become well known for hosting creative and entertaining fundraisers. In August 2008, 826LA hosted the Echo Park Lake Paddle Boat Regatta.^[20] In 2009, they hosted the first annual Craft Beer Fest at the Echoplex in Echo Park.^[21][22]

In 2010,

In 2011, director and photographer Spike Jonze and actress Miranda July competed in a ping-pong tournament to raise funds for 826LA, raising around $30,000.^[26]

In 2012, 826LA hosted the Judd and Jon Music and Comedy Hour(s), a music and comedy fundraiser featuring headliners

In 2020, 826LA hosted a live field trip for adults at the Santa Monica Airport.[28]

The organization has also hosted numerous "In Conversation" events with authors including Miranda July, Natashia Deón, Neal Katyal, and more.

References

External links

• Official website