Every year, Community-Word Project brings together various corporate partners to assist our young student writers become published authors by supporting them with the editing of their original work.
In April, volunteers from AllianceBernstein L.P., Blackrock, Moody’s, Goldman Sachs, Neuberger Berman, HBO, Linklaters LLP, Time Warner, M&T Bank, Investors Bank & ICM Partners assisted our students in the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Washington Heights to prepare for publication in an anthology of their original work.
On April 21st, team members from Blackrock joined CWP staff at PS 132 Juan Pablo Duarte in Washington Heights and helped our 2nd and 3rd graders edit narratives they had been working on.
“The Story That Was Late” by Rachell De la Cruz
The story woke up, brushed his teeth and had a big breakfast of paper then he noticed he was late for work. He felt frustrated. He took a taxi. He was in such a rush, he forgot to pay! The taxi driver shouted “come back and give me the money!”. The story just kept running to the library where all the other stories are. When he got to work, his boss told him “this is your 5th time being late”. And he was worried next time he would be fired. He decided to get an alarm clock shaped like a book so he wouldn’t be late again. He felt more secure that he wouldn’t be late anymore.
The students were thrilled to watch their rough drafts come to life on the screen with polishing and edits that made them shine. And they were happy to share their work with our volunteers!
In early May, we traveled up to the Bronx for back-to-back days of anthology editing with our corporate partners from Neuberger Berman, HBO, Linklaters LLP, UBS, Goldman Sachs, Moody’s, and Time Warner at PS 279 Captain Manuel Rivera, Jr.
The volunteers worked with our 2nd and 3rd graders there and helped them prepare their poems for publication.
“Family Poem” by Lyan Pizarro
The earth is our mother
Because we clean it
The sun is our brother
It’s our brother because it takes care of us
Our grandpa helps us be strong
The sky
The sky is our dad
Because it lifts us up to the sky
The ocean is our pet
Because its full of animals
And the star is our friend
Because it lights the way
It took two days instead of one to get all of the poems prepped for the anthologies and we are so lucky to have had the support from our corporate partners!
“Animal Time Rhyme” by Jordyn
White Bengal tiger is almost extinct,
People use their fur to make coats and rugs and that really stinks,
I think that it’s sad, and gets a lot of people mad.
We need more laws and to stop animal experimenting.
If we help people get jobs, they’ll be less tormenting.
We could put something on the internet, like poems and YouTube videos;
dogs and whales, we saw with our parents at the zoo.
But the zoo does not worry about the squirrels and let birds get them.
We also had a fabulous group from M&T Bank volunteer to polish poems from our students at PS 316 in Brooklyn off site and in their office. The team worked together to prep the poems remotely and our students were so excited to have professionals look at their work.
“I Am Water” by Kelol Mason
I move smoothly.
When I walk you will hear me coming.
I sound like splish splash.
I smell like a beautiful rose swaying in the wind.
My body is home to many living things.
Living things use me for support.
People suffer because of my mean ways.
Over 250 students were served during our anthology editing days and we could not be more grateful for the support from our corporate partners. Thank You!
