The power of social networking and web 2.0 was on display in English teacher Sarah Akhtar’s senior elective on memoir. Students were reading Mary Karr’s 1995 memoir The Liars’ Club and were so moved that they wondered if there was any way to get The New York Times bestselling author visit their class to talk about her work.
They could have written a letter or called Karr’s publicist, but instead they took to the internet. After learning that Karr would be in Boston publicizing her new book, Lit, they decided to produce a video to lure her to Beaver. The video, featuring the Beaver mascot and the top ten reasons Karr should visit Beaver, was uploaded to her Facebook fan page.
Karr’s sister saw the video and was so impressed that she told Karr that if the author didn’t visit Beaver Country Day School while in Boston she would no longer be her sister. Needless to say, the video worked, and on Friday, November 6th Mary Karr joined Beaver students for a discussion about her writing.