With an apartheid of diverse children and young adult books, as well as the dearth of rich, personalized writing opportunities in schools, the National Writing Project Director of National Programs and the Director of the Connecticut Writing Project at Fairfield University asked, ‘How might authors and teachers be brought together during the pandemic to discuss writing processes and books?’ The Write Time resulted, a digital podcast for educators, writers, young people, and families that showcases authors of children’s and young adult literature.

In this reflective article, a case study, we draw upon scholarship on a critical friendship (Schuck & Russell, 2005; Silva, 2003) that grew in 2020 as we worked to assist one another in creating NWP writing programs for teachers and youth. At the heart of our professional collaboration was our desire to maintain and cultivate community engagement (Deans, Roswell, & Wurr, 2010; Preece, 2017), while advancing racial literacies in digital spaces (Price-Dennis & Sealey-Ruiz, 2021) and as we worked with a framework for instructional equity (Muhammad, 2020). Weekly meetings led us to using Padlet for 189 hours of professional development, 9 programs with 511 youth, and 7 courses with 320 students. Padlet became a location for curation, especially as we worked to promote diverse, inclusive children’s and young adult texts as models for classroom teacher and student writers.