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"Two families, generations apart, are forever changed by a heartbreaking injustice in this poignant novel, inspired by a true story, for readers of Orphan Train and The Nightingale. Memphis, 1939. Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family's Mississippi River shantyboat. But when their father must rush their mother to the hospital one stormy night, Rill is left in charge--until strangers arrive...
2) Free lunch
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"A distinctive new voice: Rex Ogle's story of starting middle school on the free lunch program is timely, heartbreaking, and true. Free Lunch is the story of Rex Ogle's first semester in sixth grade. Rex and his baby brother often went hungry, wore secondhand clothes, and were short of school supplies, and Rex was on his school's free lunch program. Grounded in the immediacy of physical hunger and the humiliation of having to announce it every day...
3) Oliver Twist
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Oliver Twist is a classic tale of a boy of unknown parentage born in a workhouse and brought up under the cruel conditions to which pauper children were exposed in the Victorian England. With this novel, Dickens did not merely write a topical satire on the workhouse system and the role of the 1834 New Poor Law in fostering criminality. He created a moral fable about the survival of good, a romance, and a gripping story in which he exploited suspense...
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On a small Kansas farm in 1890, Christina Willems lovingly shepherds a group of displaced individuals who have come to see the Brambleville Asylum for the Poor as their home. But when a kitchen fire leaves the house uninhabitable, she must find shelter for all in her care, scattering her dear "family." Christina is forced to approach Levi Johnson, a reclusive mill owner, to take in a young blind boy named Tommy Kilgore. Levi agrees with reluctance,...
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Three days before Christmas, in the freezing slums of London's East End, thirteen-year-old Gracie Phipps and eight-year-old Minnie Maude Mudway join together in a search for Charlie, the donkey who belonged to Minnie Maude's Uncle Alf. Gracie is shocked to learn that only the day before, someone brutally murdered Uncle Alf and made off with his rag-and-bones cart and the beloved beast who pulled it.
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"The untold story of the root cause of America's education crisis--and the seemingly endless cycle of multigenerational poverty. It was only after years within the education reform movement that Natalie Wexler stumbled across a hidden explanation for our country's frustrating lack of progress when it comes to providing every child with a quality education. The problem wasn't one of the usual scapegoats: lazy teachers, shoddy facilities, lack of accountability....
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Description
In the hills of Central Appalachia, up winding, mountain roads, is a place where families face unthinkable living conditions. Isolated pockets here have three times the national poverty rate, an epidemic of drug abuse, and the shortest life span in the nation. In this program, Diane Sawyer travels to the Appalachian Mountains to report on children who live in rural poverty, and in particular, four who are determined to find a better life. For nearly...
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Washington Post education reporter Mathews delves into the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) and follows the enterprise's founders, Mike Feinberg and Dave Levin, from their days as young educators in the Teach for America program to heading one of the country's most controversial education programs running today.
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"Young Philip Pirrip, nicknamed Pip, is meant to become an apprentice for his brother-in-law, a poor blacksmith. But his destiny changes upon meeting three unusual people: an escaped convict, a tragic woman, and a captivating young girl. Pip's life is altered in an instant when a secret benefactor gives him a large sum of money. Pip has "great expectations" for his new life as successful and wealthy life as a young gentleman. Has his life actually...
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Laura Schroff was a successful ad sales rep living and working in Manhattan. Maurice was a homeless, eleven-year-old panhandler on the street. He asked for spare change; she kept walking. But then something stopped her in her tracks, and she turned around and went back. And she continued to go back, again and again. They met nearly every week for years and built an unexpected friendship that has today spanned almost three decades, bringing life to...
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Description
South Dakota's Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is home to an estimated 35,000 people, most of whom identify as Oglala Lakota Sioux. Unfortunately, 47% of people on Pine Ridge live below the federal poverty level. Most adults are unemployed, and rampant alcoholism combined with underfunded schools make it a tough place to grow up. In this ABC News program, Diane Sawyer visits Pine Ridge to report on the reservation's problem with poverty and to meet...