Brooklyn Center HS Students Turn Class Project into Book
Some Brooklyn Center High School students can now add book authors to their resumes.
Last school year, ninth-grade students were assigned a project centered around migration. The scholars shared their family’s history of migration and immigration. The project was so successful that it developed into a powerful student-authored book.
“This is entirely student done. The title, the concept, the writing,” said geography teacher Tom Parks.
The book is titled “What Goes On In Our Shadows” and is a collection of 29 stories. It shares stories of the students’ families migrating to the United States.
Brooklyn Center High School students turned class project into a book.
“We just wrote about migration stories, the journey of it, and how it affects people,” explained Moises Soto Puente, senior editor for the book. The story he wrote was fictional.
“I’ve always loved studying about Japan and their history, so I just did an immigration story about that,” he said.
Soto Puente was born in the United States, but his parents immigrated from Mexico. The now-10th grader says he can relate to the struggles some immigrants face.
“They are just stared at in a particular way because they look different or their culture is different, or they speak a different language, or they have a particular accent when they speak English,” said Soto Puente.
The student-published book is now being used throughout classes in the Brooklyn Center School District.
Soto Puente says he hopes the stories will inspire people to be more understanding and accepting of other cultures and races.
“These people are real people in our communities. They come to a new place, and they just do their best to learn their surroundings and fit in,” he said.
A grant-funded the book. The school is working on getting more funds to do a second printing.
Brooklyn Center High School
