The Portland Public Schools has been awarded $25,000 from The Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation to purchase books for the libraries of each of the district’s three middle schools: Lyman Moore, King and Lincoln. Each school’s library will be able to buy about 400 books. The books will benefit students who are English language learners and some of the funds also will be used to expand the libraries’ collections with books representing culturally diverse perspectives.
Court Caywood, library media specialist at Moore and Lincoln; Meredith Doyle, a multilingual educator at Moore and James Ford, that school’s former community engagement coordinator, led the effort to apply for the award.
“We will be able to build three sections of diverse lower reading level/high interest books in each middle school library,” Doyle said. “This will finally enable all of our ESOL newcomers to ‘shop’ and browse for books like all of the other students. I have been dreaming and asking for this for almost ten years and now it is about to become reality.”
The books, written specifically for English language learners, will bridge the gap between the multilingual students’ current level of English proficiency and the texts written for English speakers at the middle school level.
With approximately 6,600 students, the Portland Public Schools is Maine’s largest and most diverse school district. Many students and their families are multilingual, collectively speaking more than 50 languages. About one third of the district’s students are English language learners.
Currently, these students must rely on teachers providing these books or finding online resources. The award will now make the middle school libraries more accessible and equitable spaces for these new students learning English. In addition to diverse low-level, high-interest books for students learning English, the plan is to supplement the current collection with books representing culturally diverse perspectives from local authors and illustrators such as Daniel Minter, Samara Cole Doyon, Donald Soctomah, as well as books curated by the local nonprofits, I'm Your Neighbor and The Telling Room. The accessibility of such literature will benefit all students, not just those learning English.
Caywood, Doyle and Ford expressed their gratitude to The Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes strengthening and supporting communities. “We are thrilled about the access this will grant our students to information and literature,” Caywood said.
The Portland Public Schools is Maine’s largest school district, with more than 6,600 students, and it’s also the most diverse. About one-third of the district’s students come from homes where languages other than English are spoken—a total of 53 languages. Approximately 48 percent of the district’s students are white and 52 percent are students of color. Nearly half of PPS students qualify for free or reduced-price school meals.