Books with author Bel Kaufman

Sylvia Barrett arrives at New York City’s Calvin Coolidge High fresh from earning literature degrees at Hunter College and eager to shape young minds. Instead she encounters broken windows, a lack of supplies, a stifling bureaucracy, and students with no interest in Chaucer. Her bumpy yet ultimately rewarding journey is narrated through an extraordinary collection of correspondence—sternly worded yet nonsensical administrative memos, furtive notes of wisdom from teacher to teacher, “polio consent slips,” and student homework assignments that unwittingly speak from the heart. An instant bestseller when it was first published in 1964, Up the Down Staircase remains as poignant, devastating, laugh-out-loud funny, and relevant today as ever. It timelessly depicts a beleaguered public school system redeemed by teachers who love to teach and students who long to be recognized.

Escorted tours are highly regimented and expensive averaging $300-$500 per person per day excluding airfare. Bob Kaufman knows. For over 30 years he ran National Travel Vacations, Inc. a tour operator who offered escorted tours on contract to travel agents. If you don’t want to be told that you must be on the bus at 8 AM, and that you have only one hour to shop in Venice, this book is for you. If you don’t want to feel stressed out driving in a strange country, where everyone drives exceptionally fast, this book is for you. If you like waking up when you want, eating when you want and spending as much time as you want on each sight, this book will show you how to do it. Bob Kaufman’s “Italy The Best Places to See by Rail” is the essential book you need to plan an in-expensive rail tour of Italy travelling on the newest state-of-the–art ultra-modern high-speed trains. The book is made for seniors and the younger generations, who are not comfortable or care not to take escorted tours or drive in a foreign country. For seniors, the book is easier to read because it is printed in a larger and bold type than normal travel books. The author outlines five major itineraries which include: Rome, Florence, Venice, the Lakes District (Como, Maggiore and Lugano), and an over the Alps option on the world famous Bernina Express, the Amalfi Coast and Sicily. Kaufman describes each itinerary and just how to plan it. Sicily is further broken down into day trips from Palermo and the Taormina areas. Day trips from Florence to Pisa, Lucca, Siena, San Gimignano and the Cinque Terre are described in detail. The author has a full chapter devoted to hotels near the train stations so you don’t have to walk more than 10-15 minutes to your hotel. He even explains how to evaluate and choose each hotel along the way. The book is easy to read (it’s Kaufman’s second book) and chuck full of information needed to plan your in-expensive rail trip including websites on how to obtain your rail and attraction tickets for the Coliseum and Sistine Chapel and more. This will save you hours of time and money on the internet. Kaufman includes: tables, maps an index of section headings, places of interest, hotels and recommended restaurants from almost thirty trips to this beautiful country. His second book on travel, “SPAIN The Best Places to See by Rail is due out in 2020.” Use this book for planning, and take it along with you and a good tour book of Italy and you will not be disappointed with your vacation. Do take a look at the reviews on the rear cover of this book.

Sylvia Barrett arrives at New York City’s Calvin Coolidge High fresh from earning literature degrees at Hunter College and eager to shape young minds. Instead she encounters broken windows, a lack of supplies, a stifling bureaucracy, and students with no interest in Chaucer. Her bumpy yet ultimately rewarding journey is narrated through an extraordinary collection of correspondence—sternly worded yet nonsensical administrative memos, furtive notes of wisdom from teacher to teacher, “polio consent slips,” and student homework assignments that unwittingly speak from the heart. An instant bestseller when it was first published in 1964, Up the Down Staircase remains as poignant, devastating, laugh-out-loud funny, and relevant today as ever. It timelessly depicts a beleaguered public school system redeemed by teachers who love to teach and students who long to be recognized.

Escorted tours are highly regimented and expensive averaging $300-$500 per person per day excluding airfare. Bob Kaufman knows. For over 30 years he ran National Travel Vacations, Inc. a tour operator who offered escorted tours on contract to travel agents. If you don’t want to be told that you must be on the bus at 8 AM, and that you have only one hour to shop in Venice, this book is for you. If you don’t want to feel stressed out driving in a strange country, where everyone drives exceptionally fast, this book is for you. If you like waking up when you want, eating when you want and spending as much time as you want on each sight, this book will show you how to do it. Bob Kaufman’s “Italy The Best Places to See by Rail” is the essential book you need to plan an in-expensive rail tour of Italy travelling on the newest state-of-the–art ultra-modern high-speed trains. The book is made for seniors and the younger generations, who are not comfortable or care not to take escorted tours or drive in a foreign country. For seniors, the book is easier to read because it is printed in a larger and bold type than normal travel books. The author outlines five major itineraries which include: Rome, Florence, Venice, the Lakes District (Como, Maggiore and Lugano), and an over the Alps option on the world famous Bernina Express, the Amalfi Coast and Sicily. Kaufman describes each itinerary and just how to plan it. Sicily is further broken down into day trips from Palermo and the Taormina areas. Day trips from Florence to Pisa, Lucca, Siena, San Gimignano and the Cinque Terre are described in detail. The author has a full chapter devoted to hotels near the train stations so you don’t have to walk more than 10-15 minutes to your hotel. He even explains how to evaluate and choose each hotel along the way. The book is easy to read (it’s Kaufman’s second book) and chuck full of information needed to plan your in-expensive rail trip including websites on how to obtain your rail and attraction tickets for the Coliseum and Sistine Chapel and more. This will save you hours of time and money on the internet. Kaufman includes: tables, maps an index of section headings, places of interest, hotels and recommended restaurants from almost thirty trips to this beautiful country. His second book on travel, “SPAIN The Best Places to See by Rail is due out in 2020.” Use this book for planning, and take it along with you and a good tour book of Italy and you will not be disappointed with your vacation. Do take a look at the reviews on the rear cover of this book.

Bel Kaufman's Up the Down Staircase is one of the best-loved novels of our time. It has been translated into sixteen languages, made into a prize-winning motion picture, and staged as a play at high schools all over the United States; its very title has become part of the American idiom. Never before has a novel so compellingly laid bare the inner workings of a metropolitan high school. Up the Down Staircase is the funny and touching story of a committed, idealistic teacher whose dash with school bureaucracy is a timeless lesson for students, teachers, parents--anyone concerned about public education. Bel Kaufman lets her characters speak for themselves through memos, letters, directives from the principal, comments by students, notes between teachers, and papers from desk drawers and wastebaskets, evoking a vivid picture of teachers fighting the good fight against all that stands in the way of good teaching.