Bookmobile Keeps ‘Black Studies Alive’ For NYC Public School Students

A mobile bus is making sure Black studies is being taught to New York City students—regardless of how hard too many other areas of the country try to stop it.

“The Black Studies: An Education for Me + You Bookmobile” is distributing books featured in this fall’s new Black Studies curriculum in the city’s five boroughs—Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island—CBS News reports.

Students of New York City public schools can get their hands on stacks of books by diverse voices with stories that cater to young readers. Created by The United Way and the Education Equity Action Plan Coalition, the bus was turned into a museum in addition to providing positive resources to neighborhoods thanks to 5,000 books by Black authors.

On top of receiving books, Bookmobile provides lessons on local history like the Harlem Renaissance and inner pride. “It’s a small snippet of what the Black Studies curriculum could potentially look like,” Grace Bonilla, president and CEO of United Way of NYC, said of the Bookmobile program. The benefits extend beyond students.

“These books will be a resource for teachers to say, well how do I talk about this particular subject or this particular time in history, and how do I integrate that into something that’s fun for kids to do?” Bonilla added. “It’s just going to give educators choices.”

The latest stop for the bus was Staten Island on June 23. Visitors received free books for students in pre-K to the eighth grade. Guests also had the chance to interact with a series of vignettes related to the Black experience and engage in interactive activities on an actual school bus.

The city’s Department of Education is hoping to include Staten Island’s Sandy Ground among the lessons being taught, which would introduce students to the nation’s oldest free Black settlement still occupied by descendants of the original settlers, according to SI Live.