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For more information and media access to the convention, please complete the Press Credential Application.

ECBACC Vice President Akinseye Brown leads STARS Workshop at Barnes & Noble Bookstore Philadelphia, PA.

ECBACC Founder Yumy Odom and Professional comic book illustrator Eric Battle of Philadelphia, show their support for positive images and youth literacy at the STARS Workshop.

Representing ECBACC, Inc. Shenkarr Davis, Yumy Odom and Akinseye Brown pose with Barnes & Noble’s Community Relations Manager Rosene Campaine at the well received two-day STARS event.

Young man shares his original comic book story with workshop participants!

Young lady tries her hand at being an author during the STARS Workshop 2011!

Participants hard at work on their own comic books at STARS!

ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. COMIC BOOK FAIR at BARNES & NOBLE BOOKSTORE

Do you really like comic books? Well, so does The East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention, Inc. We like them so much that we are teaming up with Barnes & Noble Bookstores to encourage creativity and combat illiteracy one superhero at a time! On Saturday, February 12th and Sunday, February 13th, 2011, ECBACC, Inc. will bring its S.T.A.R.S. program to Center City.  S.T.A.R.S, an interactive youth program that uses comic book storytelling to promote literacy, will be offered free-of-charge to the public from 12pm to 3pm at the Barnes & Noble Bookstore located in Rittenhouse Square at 1805 Walnut St. / Philadelphia, PA 19103. In an effort to further support this ECBACC comic book initiative, Barnes & Noble will donate a significant portion of its weekend profits from those sales made in the name of ECBACC! All you need to do is attend our weekend workshop, make a purchase of any store item (including clothing merchandise, games, toys, and café menu items), and submit our special ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. voucher at the register. It’s that simple!

Can’t make our event, but still want to support it? Not a problem! During the February 12th and 13th weekend go to your nearest Barnes & Noble Bookstore anywhere in the continental U.S., make a purchase of any store item and submit our special ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. voucher at the register. For online shoppers, visit: BN.COM/bookfairs to support us from February 12th, 2011 to February 13th, 2011 by entering Bookfair ID 10418929 at checkout. It’s that simple!

Now, it’s easy to support this creativity and literacy initiative wherever you are. So, make a pledge to support the comic book initiative that supports you! Become a supporter! It’s easy, fun and always appreciated! Follow the link below to download your ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. voucher today!

Thank you!
ECBACC, Inc. 2011

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For more information and media access to the convention, please complete the Press Credential Application.

ECBACC, Inc. VP Akinseye Brown discusses, with a crowd of comic book enthusiasts at the Phila. Logan Branch Library, the key points of using comic book characters as a tool for expressing ideas.

Students at the Phila. Lucien Blackwell Branch Library experience writing and assembling their own comic book stories!

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ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. Education Director Akinseye Brown, a professional illustrator and author of HTD: How to Draw Afrakan Superheroes, offered two short workshops for all ages at the recent Superhero Day at Penn Museum.

Participants learned about the important parts of a story and the use of dialogue in an interactive program that emphasized creative thinking and self-expression.

ECBACC 2009: Save the Date

ECBACC, Inc. is proud to announce the 8th Annual East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention, occurring on May 15 and 16, 2009 in Philadelphia. The Crowne Plaza Philadelphia Center City is the official hotel and venue.

Interested in vending at ECBACC?

If you are interested in vending at our convention, contact ECBACC, Inc. Treasurer, Stephanie Brandford, at stephanie.brandford@ecbacc.com

Sign up to be on our mailing list to receive applications and information. Vending applications will be available to those interested after Thursday, January 1, 2009.

Guest and workshops will be announced soon.

For the latest information, you can join our general mailing list by emailing blackageofcomics@ecbacc.com. You can also go to: www.ecbacc.com, http://www.comicspace.com/ecbacc, or www.comicspace.com/ecbacc

ECBACC in Your Community!!!

Through our ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. program (Storytelling That Advances Reading Skills), we conduct comic book workshops to encourage literacy and creativity. If you would like to have us facilitate a workshop at a school, church, or organization, contact Education Chairman Akinseye Brown, at akinseye.brown@ecbacc.com.

To check out some of the community events we have participated in, visit http://ecbacc.com/wordpress/category/in-the-community/.

Thanks to the The ECBACC S.T.A.R.S. program, Fat Momma was able to bring her super powered message of self acceptance to the students of Pepper Middle School in Southwest Philadelphia.

Nell Wilson  appeared on the Sci-Fi Channels “Who Wants to Be a Superhero?” reality series. Her character “Fat Momma” drew unprecedented attention from the media, critics and viewing audience.  Nell has been traveling around the world spreading her message of self acceptance. Recent visits include:  Australia, England, New York, Detroit, Atlanta, Indianapolis, and many more!

This is one of ECBACC S.T.A.R.S’ educational events that leads up to our annual convention.

The students had a super time talking with Fat Momma.

 During ECBACC’s  2008  S.T.A.R.S. workshops children participated in various activities to enhance their reading, writing, and drawing skills. 

We do our best to spark their imagination!

Here are some photos of what they created.

The 12Comics Learning Support program is an exciting and unique program that makes learning fun through the creation of a custom comic book. The primary focus of the program is designed to empower and encourage students to enhance their knowledge and experience the incredible benefits of written expression. The students, in a class ranging from five to seven students, learn how to generate an online and printed Graphic Novel using a collaborative comic book “Superhero” script. The students are allotted eight calendar weeks to learn how to develop characters, settings and plots using persons and situations such as family members and friends. The program emphasizes student cooperation and communication as students work together to develop their character’s comic book stories. When the script is complete, it is reviewed and edited before being submitted to professional artists for artwork (pencils, inks and colors) and publication. At the end of the program, 12Comics publishes the comic book with each student receiving three copies. The comic will feature each of the characters developed in the class. Comic books are published and made available for sale on the 12Comics’ online store. A percentage of all sale proceeds, after production costs are covered, are paid to the students. At end of the program, students have the option to sign up again and repeat the class throughout the school year. Some students have used the program to start their own online business.

In our own words:
“We basically put into 12Comics everything we could’ve ever wanted in a program when we were kids. If Marvel or DC would have had a program where, for a fee, we would be able to apply what we were learning in school to create a character which would be featured in a comic book with Spiderman or Superman would we have been interested in such a program? Unequivocally YES!!!! Then as an added bonus they would throw in a cash earning incentive where our characters would have merchandise on the open market and we would receive royalties. Well that’s a no-brainer. 12Comics offers students the opportunity to become published authors and to apply their education with immediate tangible results. An ancillary achievement for the students is that in addition to being consumers of their local library or comic book shop they become contributors as well. This was the question we asked ourselves, and what essentially became the driving force behind 12Comics.”

12Comics Inc.
12Comics Learning Support Program
Infinite Possibilities

12Comics was started by Mark and Tracy Hair in 2003 with one goal in mind: To make reading and writing engaging, and fun through creating custom comic books.

Mark and Tracy, currently residing in Maplewood NJ., met each other at a church service 15 years ago. Each was a single parent of a lovely daughter, Sequoya (Tracy) and Angelica (Mark). They married in 2001 and now have their third daughter, Kelsey who is 4 years old.

Mark is a Team Lead in the Finance Dept of Deloitte and Touche and an avid 30 year comic fan and collector.

Tracy has been an educator for 20 years. She holds a Master of Science in Education from Bank Street College of Education and is currently employed at Ethical Culture Fieldston School.

Tracy along with her father, Dr. Simpson Gray, a 20 year veteran educator himself and former attorney, helped develop the 12Comics Learning Support program curriculum.
The curriculum was designed after the model of the New York City Department of Education’s Children First. It, like many of the programs designed for Children First, is a single, coherent system-wide approach for instruction in reading and writing.