Years back, our high school library celebrated the national Free Comic Book Day on the Monday following the nationally-celebrated first Saturday in May event.
It began when a comic nerd named Jay was interning with a social worker at our school and asked about helping kick one off and it slowly grew from there. Even after he was gone, he would return to help whether bringing tabletop games, and ideas to introducing me to people in the field who could also contribute. He’s about bringing people together over comics and he writes about it in magazines and on websites like this 2022 article called Why Buying Your Kids More Comic Books Can Benefit Their Mental Health for Inside Hook.
Then the pandemic hit and like many events, it fell by the wayside until this year. We were going to be hosting Steve Sheinkin as our author visit about a month before Free Comic Book Day and I wanted to make the connection between his award-winning Bomb being turned into a graphic novel and his Rabbi Harvey comics to comics in general whether our high schoolers were already fans or not. It’s as much about exposure for a new group of comics lovers as it is a place to connect for tried-and-true comics lovers.
Jay again stepped up when I reached out because I had mentioned wanting to do a panel or have experts on hands during our lunch shifts. Then we’d have passive activities (and a few active ones) surrounding the learning.
I worked with my Japanese Culture Club to design the activities and then invited classes from departments like art to take part. They heeded the call and brought down classes to learn from our panelists who ranged from a comics shop owner to an illustrator of several graphic novels who I was surprised to learn was local. The others were collectors since childhood, an independent publisher of comics, and contributors to the comics field in other capacities. But more than that, the students sat down and decoupaged a coaster from old comics, worked on a Marvel puzzle, and helped add pages to our pop-up zine.
We’re happy that these moments were captured by professionals in our district’s Communications department and shared with the school community. The smiling faces holding comics. The serious focus while creating their art. The intense language of a gaming tournament after school. Even though it was a long day setting up and breaking down, soaking up their enthusiasm is what keeps all of us in education young.
Now on to planning next year’s event…
Readers Be Advised 