All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold (2018) is a large and very colorful book written in rhyme. The setting is a classroom in which there are students representing a wide range of ethnicities. All the children are smiling all the time, so this is not a book about welcoming in one shy child who feels different. This is a book about a successful classroom in which children from diverse backgrounds share and learn. “We are part of a community. Our strength is our diversity. A shelter from adversity. All are welcome here.“
I’m left wondering where this is. On the copyright page is a bit of an explanation. "This book is inspired by Suzanne‘s daughter’s school, Kimball Elementary, where diversity and community or not just protected, but celebrated." Suzanne Kaufman created a poster about the school, which spread throughout the US. When Alexandra Penfold, the author of this book, saw the poster, “it reminded her of the schools in her community in Brooklyn.”
I happen to be
listening to an NPR podcast called “Code Switch”, which is running a series
about the schools in Queens, a borough of NYC. Apparently, Queens is one of the most, if not the
most, ethnically diverse cities in the country, and yet the schools were/are
not equitable. Schools in the southern and predominantly Black neighborhoods fare
more poorly than schools in the northern, more diverse neighborhoods. I mention
this because the title page has a picture of a taxi transporting a young Black
girl and Black gentleman, presumably her guardian. The end of the school day
shows three children walking home, yet this young Black girl must take a taxi.
This illustration leaves me wondering why the young Black girl would live such
a distance that she would need to be driven to school. Was she coming from a Black
neighborhood some distance away from where the rest of the children in the
story live? Is Suzanne Kaufman acknowledging the separateness of Black
neighborhoods?
