Upcoming Programs
Award-winning College Admission Essays
Learn how to layer your college essays with evidence of experience. Understand the purpose of the main essay and short answer questions. Parents are welcome to attend.
Topics features:
- Best brainstorm exercises for writing
- Four common mistakes students make
- Parent advice, best practices for helping
- Four things every personal essay should include
- Understanding the difference between the ‘why us,’ supplemental, and main essays
This presentation will be repeated on Sunday, May 21st, 10:30am to 12:30pm.
Dale Price, MBA, is the founder and owner of Access College America, a college planning agency and works extensively with Westlake families. Follow @AccessCollegeAmerica or visit www.AccessCollegeAmerica.org.
“中文游乐园-Chinese Learning Playground” is a Mandarin Chinese study group for school-age children. This program is led by volunteer native-Chinese-speaking parents, and teaches Chinese through an immersive setting to two tiers of learners — Advanced and Junior. The Advanced group is suitable for students with several years of Chinese learning experience. This year’s sessions follow an adaptation of the classic Chinese novel, Journey to the West, to reinforce and expand a learner’s vocabulary and communication skills. The Junior group hosts lower elementary kids, teaching the language through reading folk rhymes and simple stories in Chinese, as well as memorizing and writing Chinese characters. The sessions sometimes incorporate games, crafts, and puzzles to keep the learning experience fun and engaging.
中文游乐园-Chinese learning playground is currently organized by four volunteer parents:
- Xiaoqing Zhu, a research scientist working on video coding and streaming, whose favorite activity is reciting and chatting about Chinese poetry along with her daughter.
- Wendy You, a college finance professor, who finds it more challenging to teach her two daughters than to teach a college class.
- Nan Jiang, a Ph.D. from UT Austin and the Data Science Practice Lead at her firm, has always been passionate about helping people, especially her American-born kids, to understand and appreciate the rich Chinese culture and history, including its difficult-to-learn but fascinating language.
- Qiong Zeng, a data scientist on mobile games and automobiles, has two daughters and enjoys teaching kids Chinese and Chinese cultures.
This month, Women in Print is being offered simultaneously online and in-person.
Click here to join Women in Print, online or come to Laura’s Library to join us in-person.
If you’re having difficulties, please refer to Zoom’s support information. Westbank Library is unable to provide tech assistance during the program. Please contact questions@westbanklibrary.com if you would like to schedule tech help or if you would like additional information regarding this library program.
Led by library staff, this book club reads and discusses books focusing on women’s perspective of the world. Their reading list includes literary fiction, non-fiction, and some classic titles. Join the group on the fourth Saturday of the month at 3 p.m and on the third Saturday of the month in May, November and December.
2023 Reading Selections
- January 28th: The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo: a novel by Taylor Jenkins Reid
- February 25th: Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy
- March 25th: Horse by Geraldine Brooks
- April 22nd: Euphoria: a novel by Lily King
- May 20th: The Measure: a novel by Nikki Erlick
- June 24th: Lessons in Chemistry: a novel by Bonnie Garmus
- July 22nd: Hope and Glory by Jendella Benson
- August 26th: The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka
- September 23rd: The Good Wife of Bath: a (mostly) true story by Karen Stormer Brooks
- October 28th: The Daughter of Doctor Moreau: a novel by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
- November 18th: The Sentence by Louise Erdrich
- December 16th: I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
Please read these ground rules ahead of the conversation:
- Please keep your camera on for the discussion and provide your name.
- Mute if there is background noise.
- Respect the privacy of others by not reporting what you hear in this conversation with any specificity or attribution.
- Be respectful and listen when others are speaking.
- Allow everyone’s voice to be heard that wants to be heard.
You’re never too young for storytime! Our littlest book lovers stroll in to Infant Storytime to hear fun songs, stories, and fingerplays, followed by open free-play with other wee ones. Designed for children from 0 to 12 months old.
Click here to join the Writing Workshop, a live virtual program happening from 5-6:30pm.
If you’re having difficulties, please refer to Zoom’s support information. Westbank Library is unable to provide tech assistance during the program. Please contact questions@westbanklibrary.com if you would like to schedule tech help or if you would like additional information regarding this library program.
HYBRID: Author Panel Discussion @ Laura’s Library
Three authors of children’s middle-grade books will join us for a panel discussion about their inspiration, creative process, path to publication, and advice for up-and-coming writers!
Authors on panel:
Evan Griffith is the author of the middle-grade novel Manatee Summer and the picture book biography Secrets of the Sea: The Story of Jeanne Power, Revolutionary Marine Scientist. His next novel is The Strange Wonder of Roots, forthcoming from Quill Tree in 2024. He studied creative writing at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and received his MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.
He worked for several years as an editor at Workman Publishing, where he specialized in non-fiction for children and adults, and he continues to edit books on a freelance basis. Through his role as the youth programming specialist at The Writing Barn, he also teaches online writing classes for kids.
He lives here in Austin with a mischievous tuxedo cat and several overflowing bookshelves.
Samantha M Clark is the award-winning author of three middle-grade novels – The Boy, the Boat, and the Beast; Arrow; and American Horse Tales: Hollywood – as well as the Gemstone Dragons chapter book series. In a past life, Samantha was a photojournalist and managing editor for newspapers and magazines. She now lives with her husband and two funny dogs here in Austin, where she helps other writers as the Regional Advisor for the Austin chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators.
Jacquetta Nammar Feldman is a children’s author who lives here in Austin. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Advertising from the University of Texas at Austin, and her Master of Fine Arts in Writing for Children and Young Adults at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. She is the author of middle grade novels Wishing Upon the Same Stars and The Puttermans Are in the House.
Please read these ground rules ahead of the conversation:
- Please keep your camera on for the discussion and provide your name.
- Mute if there is background noise.
- Respect the privacy of others by not reporting what you hear in this conversation with any specificity or attribution.
- Be respectful and listen when others are speaking.
- Allow everyone’s voice to be heard that wants to be heard.
Library News
Construction Project at Laura’s Library
Anyone who came to programs at Laura's Library last summer will remember how our air conditioning struggled. While we were able to get it repaired at the time, we were advised that the repairs [...]
Recent Newsletters
Our weekly newsletter includes helpful information about library events and collections, as well as community news and public health (including COVID) updates. Subscribe in the signup box on our home page. To see the [...]
Coronavirus (COVID-19) & Public Health Info
The library is tracking local COVID data and other community health information to help you with your decision-making for your families and businesses. TRAVIS COUNTY COMMUNITY RISK Free COVID testing is likely to end [...]