Welcome back to the EWC Book Club! We are thrilled to have you! Over the next six months, it is our hope that students will forge a community bound by the power of literature.
Beginning this fall and stretching into Winter 2023, EWC students will read one book per month with optional supplemental materials. The chosen novels aim to reignite a love for the classics while also providing cultural depth that captures the diversity of contemporary society.
While there will be no writing assignments, students must read and annotate the required books. We believe that being a thoughtful reader is a foundational step toward being a thoughtful thinker! Then, once a month on Sundays, students will spend an hour discussing the book, with a focus on the sociopolitical, ethical, and literary themes it addresses.
The Book Club Mission
To Increase Awareness of Great & Diverse Literature
We loved almost all of the books we read throughout our elementary, middle, and high school curriculums. However, when we were younger, we had to actively seek out narratives from other voices that were not of the predominant gender, culture, and ethnicity in Western Literature. There is edifying, beautifully written literature beyond the mainstream that we would like to share with our EWC students. By reading about diverse characters from a diverse group of authors, students will learn how to tactfully discuss historical issues, empathize with an array of marginalized peoples, and analyze contemporary social movements.
To Inspire Our Students to Read & Enjoy
We get it—video games and Netflix are a lot of fun. However, reading is also an extraordinary and creative form of entertainment. With our carefully cultivated book lists, our goal is to introduce students to books they can relate to and enjoy reading.
To Encourage Our Students to Question & Engage
The EWC Book Club is a reading initiative intended to bolster students’ comprehension skills. Students will learn how to annotate, engage in meaningful discussion, and broaden their perspectives to include a wide range of cultures and communities. Close-reading annotation and discussion skills are important as better readers make better writers. Additionally, and—arguably—more importantly, the broadening of student perspectives gives students a foundation for building their empathy towards others inside and outside of their immediate communities. Every single Book Club, our students inspire us with their understanding of historical context and broader ethical themes within the novels we read.
Recommended for 9th grade and up