Books by authors of color that are either required or offered as ‘student choice’ texts in Middle and Upper Divisions include:
English 9
Required of All Students:
The Hate U Give – Angie Thomas
Between Shades of Grey – Ruta Sepetys
Student Choice Texts:
Passing - Nella Larsen
Monster - Walter Dean Myers
Stealing Buddha’s Dinner: A Memoir - Bich Minh Nguyen
The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho
English 10
Required of All Students:
The Good Braider – Terry Farish
A Tempest – Aime Cesaire (Companion text read along with Shakespeare’s The Tempest)
One Amazing Thing - Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Student Choice Texts:
A Very Large Expanse of Sea - Tahereh Mafi
The Belles - Dhonielle Clayton
Legend - Marie Lu
Homegoing - Yaa Gyasi
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood - Trevor Noah
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption - Bryan Stevenson
English 11 (Traditionally this course, along with Honors English 11, has focused on the evolution of American Literature. As such, a significant amount of current content is not novels, but primary source documents and shorter nonfiction passages from authors of color, including Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, and W.E.B. Du Bois. )
Required of All Students:
Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri (summer reading used to begin the year)
Their Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston
Student Choice Text:
The Woman Warrior - Maxine Hong Kingston
Honors English 11
Required of All Students:
Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison (summer reading used to begin the year)
Song of Solomon – Toni Morrison
Student Choice Texts:
Washington Black - Esi Edugyan
The Woman Warrior - Maxine Hong Kingston
English 12
Required of All Students:
The Metamorphosis – Franz Kafka
Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri
Purple Hisbiscus: A Novel – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Student Choice Texts:
A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini
Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro
Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates
Honors English 12
Required of All Students:
Man’s Search for Meaning – Victor Frankl
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption – Bryan Stevenson
Between the World and Me – Ta-Nehisi Coates
Student Choice Texts:
Passing – Nella Larsen
Song of Solomon – Toni Morrison
AP English Literature
Required of All Students:
Fasting, Feasting - Anita Desai
Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
A Book of Luminous Things: An International Anthology of Poetry – Czeslaw Milosz
One World: A Global Anthology of Short Stories – various contributors
When the Emperor Was Divine – Julie Otsuka
Student Choice Texts:
The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Diaz
The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison
Bless Me, Ultima - Rudolfo Anaya
AP English Language
Required of All Students:
Man’s Search for Meaning - Viktor Frankl
Between the World and Me – Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Norton Reader – an anthology that includes representation from an evolving diversity of voices
Student Choice Texts:
Citizen: An American Lyric – Claudia Rankine
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood – Trevor Noah
Grade 6 English
Required Texts:
Facing the Lion: Growing Up Maasai – Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton; Herman Viola
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry – Mildred Taylor
Student Choice Texts:
The Crossover – Kwame Alexander
The Greatest: Muhammad Ali – Walter Dean Myers
Brown Girl Dreaming – Jacqueline Woodson
Grade 7 English
Required Texts:
I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World (young readers’ edition) – Malala Yousefzai OR The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (young readers’ edition) – William Kampkwamba
The Red Pencil – Andrea Davis Pinkney; Shane Evans
Student Choice Texts:
Flygirl – Sherri L. Smith
Grade 8 English
Required Texts:
The House on Mango Street – Sandra Cisneros
Student Choice Texts:
American Born Chinese – Gene Leun Yang
Warcross – Marie Lu