One year after it opened, La Casita Cultural Center’s bilingual library has stayed true to its mission of encouraging Westside youth to stay connected with Hispanic arts and culture.

The bilingual library opened last April and the library will begin to publically lend books next fall, when it will be done organizing and labeling the recently catalogued books in its collection, said Luz Encarnación, the youth program coordinator and community liaison for La Casita.

This fall the center launched a weekly reading program, called Reading Circles, for 21 children between the ages of 5–12 from the Westside, said Tere Paniagua, executive director of cultural engagement for the Hispanic community at Syracuse University.

Reading Circles is a bilingual reading workshop that provides additional tutoring for the children, she said. Once they have read the books, children complete artistic projects related to their readings, Paniagua said.

Two professors from the School of Education at SU, Dalia Rodriguez and Gretchen Lopez, helped design the “tremendously successful” afterschool reading program, Paniagua said.

At the bilingual library on May 17, the children will exhibit all of the art pieces they completed since they began the reading program, Paniagua said.

Reading Circles has effectively helped the library attain one of its main goals to be a supportive resource for the youth in the community, she added.

“I’m very pleased to see how the library is becoming what it intended to be: a bilingual community library for the youth of our community,” Paniagua said.

Encarnación, the youth program coordinator and community liaison for La Casita, said many of the children have reading problems before they start Reading Circles.

The children who stumble with their words are improving, Encarnación said. She added that children who struggle with grammar are writing more and the children who had no interest in reading enjoy it now with the assistance of Reading Circles.

“The kids look forward to coming to La Casita, and it’s an amazing program. I hope we can expand it to other groups,” Encarnación said.

Many students from SU volunteer to work with the kids every week, she added.

Paniagua hopes to add a reading program for adults next year. Several local poets who would be interested in teaching adult poetry classes have approached the library as well, Encarnación said.

Encarnación said the bilingual library has collected close to a thousand books and the library hopes to double its collection every year. The books in the bilingual library are familiar to people who have grown up in Latin American countries, she said, “and that’s very unique.”

As the collection grows, Paniagua said the library would like to continue focusing on the youth.

“Next year, we want to make it a priority to build the collection, but particularly put an emphasis on the collection for children’s books,” Paniagua said.

Encarnación attributed the success of the bilingual library to SU and student volunteers. She added the library will only see more improvements once the books are available for public lending.

“The success of the library has been the collaboration with SU, the work of the students, the work of the faculty and the staff from La Casita,” Encarnación said. “I believe it’s only going to improve moving forward.”

Published on April 29, 2014 at 2:06 am

Contact Anna: almerod@syr.edu