It's That Time Again - CA Students Receive Community Read

Patrick Lynch
Contributor

The book- The Blue Star. The author-Tony Earley. The occasion-yet another community read novel for both students and the community to enjoy.

That’s right-in addition to all that fading snow, students and community members can now look forward to the arrival of this year’s community read. The Community Read Project, put on by the Canandaigua Reads Committee in conjunction with the Canandaigua School District and local libraries, is one that has been in both the school curriculum and community news for several years.

The Blue Star, this year’s book, has traveled through the entirety of the long and grueling Community Reads selection journey. Starting at the beginning of this past summer the Canandaigua Reads Committee began the complicated process of trying to decide on a book that they believed could invoke some community interest.

“We are trying to find a book that will engage as many people in the community as possible,” says Brian Moore, the head of the Canandaigua Reads Committee in addition to his position as the Lead Teacher in the Canandaigua Academy English Department.

Being well liked, however, is just one of the criteria the book must meet before it can be chosen. The forgotten and possibly the most daunting task is finding a book that both the committee agrees on and that has an author who can come visit the community. For this reason the Canandaigua Reads Committee has called on the assistance of an outside organization to get this year’s author, Tony Earley, into Canandaigua.

“Writers and Books,” the chosen organization has agreed to include Canandaigua into the circuit they have prepared for the author in the Rochester area. This team-up in combination with the financial contributions of Canandaigua National Bank, 5 Star Bank, the PTO and many others has allowed this project to continue.

Unfortunately this project doesn’t come without its imperfections. “ Teachers get to pick the books and not the students,” complains Alex Bragg, a junior at the Academy. Alex isn’t alone in his thinking. “I think the kids should have more input so they would be more likely to participate.” adds Ellen Weeks, parent of Parker and Taylor Weeks, a junior and a senior at the Academy.

But all of the students and community members who feel this way can put their minds at ease because the Canandaigua Reads Committee has taken this problem into consideration. The committee originally intended to include students into the process of selecting the book, but with all of the complications involving the budget this year they simply couldn’t manage adding yet another complication to the process.

That doesn’t mean students are completely out of the loop however. “We rely on anecdotal evidence for student feedback.” says Moore with regards to these complaints, which means each year the Committee makes a conscious effort to weigh the opinions of the students when making their decision.

As far as the book goes, students can look forward to something that parallels their own lives. In this book students will meet the seventeen year-old Jim Glass, who is trying to find himself in the midst of a nation that is on the verge of, and soon to join, its second world war. Moore describes Earley’s novel as “simplistically written but engaging.”

Different from both The Death and Life of Charley Saint Cloud and The Color of Water, The Blue Star is sure to relate with students on “the perspectives and issues when deciding what we do with our lives.” explains Moore.