For new Schools Chancellor David Banks, fostering childhood literacy is one of the New York City’s public school system’s most important and vital missions.
If children can’t read, Banks indicated on Wednesday, their efforts to learn every other subject area will become even harder.
“Literacy and reading is just so so important and if we don’t get a solid literacy foundation in place very early on, everything else that we do in the school system is [like] fighting an uphill battle,” Banks told amNewYork Metro during a interview at the New Bridges Elementary School in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. “It is critically important that we put our children in a position where they are able to have a bright start. And bright starts happen with teachers who love their children, who will nurture them but who will also ensure that they are going to learn to read.”
Banks was at New Bridges, where he began his educational career, to help the youngsters celebrate “International Read Aloud Day” on Feb. 2. The chancellor toured his old school, watched a live musical performance and read Maya Angelou’s children’s book “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me” to a second grade class.
Also visiting the school was Council member Crystal Hudson who represents the 35th City Council District, where New Bridges is located.
International Read Aloud Day was started 13 years ago by the non-profit organization Lit World and sponsored by Scholastic. Its goals are to eradicate illiteracy and celebrate literature as a global community – with more than 173 countries internationally participating.
Chancellor Banks originally worked at the building as a teacher and eventually principal of the school before pursuing a career in public service and education. Celebrating the day with students and having the ability to read to a classroom where his education career began was incredibly special for the Chancellor, he said.
“I was a teacher for several years at this school [which was then called P.S 167] and this is where I started my whole career,” Banks told a second-grader during the read aloud session. “One of the things I loved to do with all of the students was to read. Today is what they call ‘world read aloud day’, so students are reading aloud books all across the world today because we wanted to make sure that everybody recognizes that reading is really important. And the more you read, the more your mind expands.”
The chancellor and his cabinet have emphasized the importance of reading and literacy in the past, and with this visit during his second month in office, Banks continued to highlight the disparity in reading proficiency among Black and Latinx students. During the pandemic, the issue surrounding literacy has increased with educators saying that teaching pre-k and younger students to read over a virtual platform present extreme challenges.
Having Banks attend and visit New Bridges was also a great experience for the staff and faculty of the school, with principal Kevyn Bowels expressing gratitude for the Chancellor’s time.
“It was extremely exciting to have Chancellor Banks visit New Bridges today,” said Bowels. “From the moment we heard that he was coming, he and his team reached out with the lens of ‘what are the great things happening at your school and how can we help to tell that story?’. To have that affirmation and support built into the leadership of the Department of Education is obviously just a really exciting place to start.”
Speaking about his first month in office, Banks said that he was feeling enthusiastic about what was to come despite the crisis that the pandemic has brought.
“I feel strong, I feel resilient, I feel excited, in spite of all the issues and challenges walking in the door,” said Banks. “I am thrilled to have this awesome responsibility and just seeing the pride and the joy. One of the things I intend to do is to tell the great stories about what is going on in our schools . If we hear these stories we realize that a lot of the time we talk about the negative things, but there are great things that are happening in our schools and everybody needs to know it.”
