Apertures International Schools Project

Photographic Essays
Welcome to the Apertures Press web site. We invite you to participate in ourexciting new venture, the Apertures International School Photographic Project. PROJECT DESCRIPTION: Apertures has initiated a multi-year project to preparephotographic portfolios depicting school life around the world. Our books arepersonal accounts providing realistic, not posed, images of actual schoolactivities--focusing on the children and teachers involved. A wide variety of schoolsare participating: state and private, coed and single sex, secular and religious, andday and boarding--including academic levels from pre-school through high school.*Photographs*: Our photographs portray life at school from walking to school inthe morning through leaving after the closing bell. They cover all activities,including classrooms, libraries, music, art, drama, sports, lunch, play ground andrecreation, and much more. We concentrate on individuals and activities ratherthan the buildings and physical facilities.*Poems and short essays*: Interspersed among the photographs are many poemsand short comments by the children/teachers on every aspects of their schoolexperience. The written material includes humorous, insightful, critical,complementary, serious, and frivolous items--brief samples of what the childrenand teachers are thinking. While most of the written material is brief items, a fewlonger essays are included. The written material adds an important dimension tothe photographic images, providing many fascinating insights into school life.FIRST BOOK: Our first book is an in-depth look at British preparatory schools(private schools for 8-13 year olds). It is 125 pages with over 200 never-beforepublished black and white/color photographs and many historical photographs.Essays and poems portray the children's interests at each age level. The book alsodescribes the schools' historical development and assesses their current status. Itcan be ordered directly from AperturesWritten work/Poems, using checks in United States, British, orNew Zealand currency: US$24.95/UK�14.95/NZ$35.95 plusUS$2.00/UK�1.50/NZ$3.00 shipping and handling (surface mail). Note: Schoolsand libraries qualify for a 20 percent discount.BOOKS IN PROGRESS: Apertures is currently working on other school books.The current production schedule is: New Zealand (1998), Australia (1999), and aWorld overview (2000). Work is also underway on several other volumes,including: Belgium, Chile, Cuba, Ecuador, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, PuertoRico, Scotland, Singapore, South Africa, Ulster, the United States, Uruguay, andWhales. OPPORTUNITY TO PARTICIPATE: Interested schools should contactApertures project coordinator, Dennis Weidner. He will be pleased to answer anyquestions or to provide further details about the project. There are two differentopportunities to participate: *Photo sessions*: An Apertures school photographic session involves a 1-day visitby a team of two experienced Apertures photographers. No special set-up isrequired because the objective is to capture candid images of the school day. Thusthe photography is not disruptive. There is NO COST to the school which willreceive a COMPLEMENTARY set of photographs that can be used in schoolpublications. *Direct submissions*: Apertures can only visit a limited number of schoolsannually, but desires to include as wide a variety as possible. The editors thereforealso include photographs and/or written material submitted by mail or internet.Schools submitting photographs should send 2 or 3 images (good project for theschool photography club). Schools submitting written work can send shortcomments, essays, and poems that the students and teachers have written abouttheir schools and school experiences (good project for a creative writing class).Already composed material from school newspapers and magazines would also befine. Schools are also invited to submit art work with a school theme (good projectfor an art class or club). Individuals such as former students and retired teachersare also welcome to submit material which would be especially helpful for thehistorical section. Credit to the authors/photographers are given in the book. ATTACHED PHOTOGRAPHS: Attached are photographs from schools indifferent countries that Apertures has visited in preparing the various countrystudies. COMMENTS: Let us here from you. Your comments on our schools projectwould be of great interest.We are preparing a series of photographic books on schools around the world. The books published include photographs from hundredsof elementary, intermediate, and secondary schools around the world. The schools we have visited include private and state, secular and religious, boys/girls/coed, urban/suburban/rural, and large and small schools. Some photographs are from the teachers and children from many schools we were unable to visit ourselves. The photographs are designed to provide realistic images of every day school life. Included with the photographs are written submissions by the children and teachers describing their individual school experiences. The photographs and written work describe all aspects of school life: buildings,coming and going to school, day care, classrooms, subjects, books/libraries,lunch, activities, national culture, computers, sports, special needs, recreation, animals, individuals, friends, minority groups, foreign students, school uniforms, boarding, religion, and other aspects of school life.
Material Needed
While we have visited nearly a thousand schools, we would also liketo include material from other interested schools that we have nothad a chance to visit. We would be interested in any of the following that you may wish to submit:1. Line drawings on any aspect of school life2. Poems, short essays, and comments about any aspect of schoollife (from students, teachers, or adults looking back on theirschool days). This material can be serious, funny, irreverent, complimentary, critical--just about anything you may want to sayas long as it is not rude.3. Photographs on some aspect of school life we have not covered.We would especially like photographs on special events (ANZAC day,calf day, ect.), a formal haka, action shots from a school match (rugby, hokey, cricket, or netball). Most of the photographs we havetaken during our visits, but these are images we have not had theopportunity to photograph.4. Old time photographs to illustrate an introductory chapter describingthe historical development of New Zealand education.
Written Work/Poems
ConkersHe's bonkersAbout conkers
Favourite links
 

British Preparatory Schools
Details on our overall school photographic project

New Zealand schools
Details on our upcoming New Zealand book


British Preparatory Schools
Details on the Apertures book: Boys' Preparatory Schools

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