Announcing: Comics, Collections, and the Common Core - A KRC Pre-Conference

Finally, the thing I have been working on for the past several months along with several awesome collaborators can be announced!

Comics, Collections, and the Common Core! A professional development pre-conference based around comics, libraries and K-12 education. It's happening on Friday, June 21, 2013, on the campus of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

In the morning, cartoonist and educator Jerzy Drozd will be offering a workshop on how to integrate comics into your curriculum.

In the early afternoon, you can attend two panel discussions: the first is a panel of librarians talking about how they select comics for their collections; the second is a panel of cartoonists (including the awesome Raina Telgemeier, creator of Smile & Drama, and Dave Roman, creator of Astronaut Academy) on how to read comics.

In the late afternoon, you'll have the choice of attending either a session at the UM Museum of Art about how comics relate to the wider world of visual art; or a session in the UM Library Special Collections about how comics have impacted and been impacted by social movements.

In the evening, there will be a meet-and-greet and giant draw wall at Dominicks, a local watering hole.

Best of all, it is FREE!

You an find out more about the day and the sessions and register for the sessions of your choosing at http://mlatcomics.com/krc/cccc

This pre-conference is a collaboration between Kids Read Comics, the Ann Arbor Book Festival, the Ann Arbor District Library, and the University of Michigan Library.

The 99 come to Campus

Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, creator of the comic book The 99, will be speaking at the Michigan Theatre on December 8 as part of the prestigious Penny Stamps lecture series. Dr. Al-Mutawa and The 99 were also the subject of a recent interesting documentary on PBS.

656 Comics Collective in Ann Arbor on Friday

This coming Friday, the comics collective 656 comes to Ann Arbor for a public presentation and book signing.

24 Hour Comics Day

Our library, in association with the Eisner Spirit of Comics award-winning Vault of Midnight comic store, will be hosting a 24 Hour Comics day event from Noon on Saturday October 2 to Noon on Sunday October 3. More information at http://www.lib.umich.edu/24-hour-comics-day-duderstadt .

Details are still being ironed out, but we hope to have food & caffeine available in addition to a space for creating. We're also talking with our friends at MPublishing about putting together an anthology of 24-hour comics created at the event.

A quick summary of last evening's graphic novels panel

The room was packed, with people sitting on the floor and standing in the back. Three great speakers, which meant that my duties as moderator basically consisted of introducing the speakers and then fielding questions at the end.

Eric Rabkin walked us through a close reading of the classic children's picture book Goodbye Moon, making the case for a visual language that can be every bit as complex as the written word and intuitively understood by young children.

Jim Ottaviani made the case for using comics to tell stories of science (which, he says, is more readily accepted by science people than comics people!) and demonstrated the creation of a scene from T-Minus, from research to writing to the final printed page.

Phoebe Gloecker talked about why she chooses to draw comics and how it is an emotional engagement for her. She talked some about her experiences traveling to Mexico for frist-hand research on her latest project, and about how the new generation of eBooks readers like the iPad may open new creative freedoms for comics creators.

A big thanks to the staff of the Shapiro library for putting the panel together and providing the space, and to our panelists who gave three very different by very engaging presentations.

(There was a video recording made of the panel, but I'm not sure if it will be made widely available...)

This Evening!

Graphic Novels Panel: March 16

Circle the Date: March 17

On March 17, 2010, I will be moderating a Graphic Novels Panel as part of the Shapiro Library's Spotlight Series.

On the panel will be three members of the U-M faculty who are involved in one way or another with comics: Phoebe Gloeckner, Jim Ottaviani, and Eric Rabkin.

The panel will be from 7-8:30pm in the Screening Room on the 2nd floor of the Shapiro Library.

I'm quite looking forward to having the three of them together in a room talking comics creation and theory!

Phoebe Gloeckner - Thursday

Artist/Cartoonist/Professor Phoebe Gloeckner will be the featured speaker at the Penny Stamps Lecture Series this Thursday, 5pm at the Michigan Theater in downtown Ann Arbor.

If like me you are unable to attend (I have a prior commitment at the Serious Games Expo), the Penny Stamps lectures are available via podcast a few days after they occur.