Kids Comic Con, the annual NY-based event celebrating kids and comics, will have a variety of activities at this year’s NYCC, including a SuperhEro Day at Ronald MacDonald House and panels showcasing what kids, comics and cons can do together. Kids Comic COn founder Alex Simmons will be at all the events. Here’s all the info via PR:
On Saturday, October 4, in anticipation of the big NYCC weekend, Ronald McDonald House New York City will host SUPERHERO DAY, an event being co-run by the KCC team. At this special private event, everyone’s a hero! In addition to inviting its own guests, Ronald McDonald House is also opening its doors to the patients and families of neighboring children’s hospitals. The Ronald McDonald House will be decked out in super-heroic fashion and there will be many giveaways available including free comic books and movie posters. Other activities scheduled for the event include:
• Opportunities to meet law enforcement officers
• Costumed hero characters on “patrol”
• Autograph signing with Dark Knight author Brandon Snider
• Cartoonists doing free sketches
• Archie Comics Station
• Face Painting Station
• Giant Superhero Balloons
• Dylan’s Candy Bar StationIn addition to co-running the event, KCC will also have their own Kids Comic Con Station where artists including Jim Salicrup, Suzannah Rowntree, Chris Giarrusso, Diana Leto and Soriah Chavel will offer free sketches to the children.
On day one of NYCC, KCC co-founder Alex Simmons takes part in the panel, Comics to Expand Your Brain: Educational Graphic Novels in Public and School Libraries. Simmons and his fellow panelists will discuss graphic novels focusing on math, science and historical events as valuable tools for the classroom or library that can help educate as they entertain. The panel takes place on Thursday, October 9 from 4:00-4:45 p.m. in room 1B03.
On Saturday, October 11 members of the KCC Roadshow return to NYCC for an encore presentation of the well-received panel from last year’s NYCC, Creatively Energizing Your Students with Comic Books and the Arts. The panel will explore how to utilize popular entertainment to inspire and empower youth to learn and express themselves in unique ways, taking a look at how comics, performance, and music can be used in classrooms, libraries, and after school programs to engage students.
Included on the panel will be such Kids Comic Con luminaries as:
• Leslie Carrara-Rudolph (puppeteer and voice of Sesame Street’s Abby Cadabby)
• Noel MacNeal (Writer, Director, Puppeteer, voice of Bear in the Big Blue House)
• Ray Felix (Executive Director of Bronx Heroes ComicCon, educator, Broadway/movie/TV art director, comics writer: A World Without Superheroes)
• Diana Leto (Designer/Production Artist: Sesame Street, artist for Cave Girl comic strip and IDW’s My Little Pony comic book)
• Alex Simmons (KCC co-founder, educator, playwright, comics writer: Archie, Tarzan, Scooby Doo)
• Paul Castiglia (comics writer-editor-historian: Archie, Sonic the Hedgehog, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)
• Mike Lopez (educator and moderator of the panel)Special guests on the panel will be Abby Gerdts, Director of Programming for Artists Striving to End Poverty and various artists from the initiative. The panel takes place from 11:15 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. in room 1A05.
Alex Simmons closes out the KCC-related programming with his popular Sci-Tech Heroes workshop which he has given at several past events. The workshop explores the amazing world of science through the imaginative realm of comics. Kids will examine the powers of a popular hero, and then create their own hero or villain based in real science. Their characters must be able to create a natural disaster… or survive one. It’s a fun way for kids to see the possibilities of the future, and their place in it as Creators, Inventors or Explorers. The Sci-Tech Heroes workshop blasts off on Saturday, October 11 from 3:15-4:15 p.m. in the Family Room HQ – 1C02
“KCC’s primary goal is to promote reading, creativity, and exploration in kids’ lives,” said Simmons. “Now more than ever it is imperative that young people embrace a continuous flow of positive ideas, skills and outlets for their thinking as well as self-esteem. Since 2007 our annual Kids Comic Con event has introduced thousands of kids and families to the power of imagination and creativity,” added Simmons. “Our road shows have traveled from Upstate New York to Miami to Senegal in Africa. We continue to provide interactive programming to Ronald McDonald House NYC and partner with them, and others, in its fight for children against cancer.”
