INDIANAPOLIS — The message behind a new children’s book is to inspire little girls that they can be anything they can dream of. “When I Grow Up I Can Be Anything” is a new book authored by a woman from Carmel.
IUPUI graduate, Jalysa King, 31, wrote the children’s book five years ago on a whim. After several years of hard work, the book is published and ready to be put on book shelves.
She has been working on this project along with working full-time as a Program Outreach Manager in the Family Medicine Division at IU School of Medicine. King said she passionate about health disparities and representation in the community, and she works with students interested in the health profession by getting them into clinicals around rural communities and underserved populations.
This is King’s first children’s book. She said she saw a disparity of black main characters in children’s stories and wanted to put Black girls in the spotlight, showing the book’s readers that this population of young girls have endless opportunities as they get older.
Kings hopes this book relates to all kids, regardless of what they look like, to highlight the importance of representation for young children and the joys of thinking big.
“I really wanted this book to not only be representative for little black girls but just kids and even adults everywhere that your dreams are never too big to accomplish,” King explains. “It is able for them to see not only a girl doing a cool job, but also a little Black girl doing that job and seeing that she is centered in that story. So I think that represented in diverse books are important for every kid’s book shelf and not just the population it represents.”
Click on the link to purchase “When I Grow Up I Can Be Anything,” by Jalysa King.
