Celebrate the Literary Arts
Locavore Lit is a free resource for teachers with a built-in classroom program. We are currently working with John Muir High School, Pasadena High School, and Octavia E. Butler Magnet. Students connect the stories and poetry they study with the creators, engage in dialogue, and develop their own writing skills. Along with story content provided by leading and emerging Los Angeles-area authors and illustrated artwork, teachers are provided with a state-of-the-art curriculum.
This program is primarily funded through a generous grant provided by the Pasadena Community Foundation. If you are interested in supporting the program please visit our donate page.
““I want to thank you for allowing my / our kids to have such a wonderful experience the last two days. I live for the moments where kids feel like anything in their lives is possible, and the last two days, your organization and guest authors have made that possible.” ”
Locavore Lit unites writers, artists, and educators to ignite young minds with a love of reading, writing, and the visual arts. We consider ourselves to be a new kind of beast: part online literary journal, part educator’s resource center, and part community salon. Our goal is to connect youth with an open-source text filled with contemporary works by local writers and artists while simultaneously sharing LA’s rich literary offerings with the world.
Our site features literary journals published each year containing a collection of short fiction and nonfiction, poetry, articles, essays, memoir excerpts, and artwork created for us by writers and artists primarily from the Los Angeles region. Texts and images are paired with tailormade lesson plans, designed to help teachers introduce locally produced writing and artwork into their classrooms so that students may better see themselves and their communities represented in their curriculum. Filling the gap left by expensive, monolithic, and often outdated textbooks, our literature and artwork are selected to resonate with LA-based youth and celebrate the full diversity of Los Angeles, its culture, and its people.
Jessica Lopez, Program Manager
Jessica Lopez earned her Bachelor of Arts in Human Development and Psychology as a first-generation Latina student. Her background is primarily in education and has worked as a behavioral interventionist with students with special needs. As the Program Manager of Light Bringer Project, she continues to devote her energy toward empowering young people to express themselves and build pathways to their creative career choices.
Valentina Gomez, Literary Arts Coordinator
Valentina Gomez is a writer and literary enthusiast with an educational background in psychology and creative writing from the University of Southern California. She recently completed a Master of Arts in Literary Editing and Publishing from the same university. Currently, she serves as the Literary Arts Coordinator for Lightbringer Project, an arts and education non-profit based in Pasadena. Her creative work has been published in F(r)iction, an imprint of Brink Literacy Project, and her research has been published in Cognitive Development, a peer-reviewed journal of psychology.
Jervey Tervalon, Artistic Director
Jervey Tervalon, MFA, is the award-winning, Los Angeles Times bestselling author of five books including Understanding This, a novel based on his experiences teaching at Locke High School in Los Angeles, for which he won the Quality Paper Book Club’s New Voice’s Award. Jervey was born in New Orleans and raised in the Jefferson Park neighborhood of Los Angeles where he attended Foshay Junior High. He received his MFA in Creative Writing from UC Irvine and was a Disney Screenwriting fellow and a Shanghai Writers Association Fellow. He is the Founder and Director of Literature for Life. He is also the Co-founder and Literary Director of LitFest Pasadena. Currently he teaches fiction writing and Literature at the College of Creative Studies at U.C. Santa Barbara. His Latest novel is Monster’s Chef published by Amistad/HarperCollins.
Scott Gandell, Art Director
Scott Gandell wears many hats. He descends from a long line of creatives and business professionals. His experience is as diverse as the subjects he illustrates. You may want to visit Pop Secret Gallery where he has made a home for The Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles of which he is a Board Member. His network is vast and he is a proud alumnus of Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.
