Academy Implements Summer Reading Initiative for Preps

This summer, incoming preps will read The Prince of los Cocuyos: A Miami Childhood as assigned material to facilitate a common ground for discussion and connection. Members of the Academy Life Task Force and the Orientation Planning Committee, who organized this initiative, hope that the reading will bring the diverse student body together.

English Instructor Tyler Caldwell, who coordinated the ninth grade program,  selected The Prince of los Cocuyos: A Miami Childhood by Richard Blanco to introduce students to a range of new experiences. “[We] aim to preface the upcoming year of discovery, curiosity and learning [with this assignment],” he said. “Students will arrive with a range of experiences and perspectives. We encourage all students to consider how we might prepare individually to enter, celebrate and nurture a diverse and inclusive community during the upcoming school year.”

Furthermore, author Richard Blanco will speak on campus in the fall of 2019.  “I worked with Mr. Myers to coordinate an assembly in early September so that the author, Richard Blanco, will meet with the whole school and then meet separately with just the [prep class],” Caldwell said. “These assemblies will allow us to build programming around the summer [reading] and to engage the rest of the school in the ideas, themes and experiences Blanco’s book addresses.”

For returning students, members of the Martin Luther King Jr. Day Planning Committee have proposed pilots to require Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, a public interest lawyer and two-time assembly speaker, which discusses mass incarceration. However, these plans have yet to be passed and implemented.

This idea for the school-wide reading program was the brainchild of upper Lilly Pinciaro.

“I had the idea after Bryan Stevenson came … my friend goes to Lawrenceville Academy and she had Just Mercy as required reading over the summer,” Pinciaro said. “I thought this would be a really important step for Exeter.”

After pitching her idea to the MLK Committee, Pinciaro was able to garner support from many members. “I brought it up in MLK committee because we were discussing ways in which we could continue Bryan Stevenson’s message after his assembly,” she said. Believing that the reading would be beneficial to the student body, the committee sent a letter to Principal Bill Rawson to advocate for his support.

According to Pinciaro, Rawson supported the proposal, but there was some discussion regarding to whom the required reading would apply. “Rawson responded very positively and it’s definitely something he’s interested in,” Pinciaro said. “However, I’m not sure that it would be able to happen for the whole school due to the required reading already in place for incoming preps.”

However, proposals for collective readings are not new, according to English Instructor Mercedes Carbonell. “For a long time, there was a staple in the English Department to have a core text during the year,” she said. “In this case, the hope is that a summer reading each year might flourish; there is a prep common text arising. Perhaps there will one day be a common text for each rising grade.”

The vision for this proposal includes a series of discussions at the beginning of the school year with this common book.

Members of the community had differing ideas about the impact of a required reading. Regardless of the selected text, upper Jasmine Liao had doubts over the enforceability of the proposal. “I don't know how feasible a reading would be … it might be required, [but] I doubt many people would actually read it,” she said. “I don’t know if it would make much of a difference.”

On the other hand, upper Kathy Lee remarked that a required reading about Bryan Stevenson’s work would benefit the Exeter community. “If Just Mercy passes, it definitely should be a required reading,” she said. “I read it on the plane and it just really opened my mind about just how our system is flawed. I think the reading would help to shed light on the things that most people don't see.”

Senior Catherine Skinner agreed with Lee, describing the impact of Stevenson’s words. “The book was absolutely eye-opening, and as a fellow Alabamian, I definitely agree that things should change,” she said. “Just seeing systemic issues even in my own backyard that even I’m blind to was something you just can't get every day. I highly recommend that everyone should read this book.”

On the other hand, lower Nam Nguyen described how the impact of the reading may not be far-reaching since not all Exonians would complete the summer reading. “I think while some Exonians would complete the reading, others would not,” he said. “Therefore, regardless of the caliber of the book, I do not imagine that the impact of the reading would be substantial.”

Lower Caleb Richmond shared Nguyen’s skepticism for required reading, especially for incoming preps. “Due to the different styles of Exeter teachers, and all of the different texts they assign, I think it would be hard for a common text to be effective,” he said. “Also, preps do not know how to read texts for a Harkness discussion yet, so I’m not sure how well they would be able to find meaning from the text.”

Carbonell imagined a campus where students read Just Mercy, concluding that the reading would improve Exeter’s consciousness of race issues. “Imagine walking into dining hall as a new lower and talking with someone who works in dining hall about Just Mercy,” she said. “Imagine entering as a prep and being uncertain, and yet you know that you can always turn to the person next to you and say, ‘What did you think of Just Mercy?’ What is our collective consciousness? What will happen at all of the Harkness tables all over the school if we all have one common text ... to speak?”

Regardless, Pinciaro concluded that a book should be required for the entirety of the student body so that the impact of the text reaches every member of the Exeter community.

Similar to Caldwell’s justification for the prep reading, Pinciaro believes that each student must be given a chance to enter thoughtful discussions. “I think that we lacked a common vocabulary, and, as a school that advertises that we have people from all quarters, we need to understand that many people do not have experience discussing issues of  Diversity, Equity and Inclusion,” she said.

Pinciaro added, “We have a duty, as a school, to help people educate themselves and provide a common basis for understanding for the entirety of the student body."