Teachers & Students
Rebecca at your college or university
If you would like to bring Rebecca to your college or university, please e-mail details about your request to Miriam Feuerle at Lyceum Agency: or call her at 503.467.4621.
In addition to being a riveting reading experience, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks has become an important educational tool. Praised for its research, reportage, the ethical issues it has raised, and its unique relevance to a wide range of disciplines from the arts and sciences to law, medicine, anthropology, African American Studies, and more, the book is being used in hundreds of classrooms and teaching programs around the country. It has been selected for common reading at more than 100 colleges and universities and is widely used in high schools, medical schools, and professional programs. If you are considering adopting the book and inviting Rebecca to speak on campus, please visit the Community Reads/FYE page of this site to learn more, read about experiences other groups are having with Rebecca and The Immortal Life, and see video footage of students discussing the book. If you have already adopted the book, below you’ll find teaching and reading guides, and other resources designed to enhance your discussion of The Immortal Life.
Resources
- Teacher’s Guide (PDF)
- Timeline (PDF)
- Cast of Characters (PDF)
- Listen to the Radiolab segment on The Immortal Life featuring Rebecca Skloot and Deborah Lacks discussing Henrietta and her cells, as well as exclusive audio clips of Rebecca’s interview tapes so students can listen to recordings of actual scenes they read about in the book.
- Read about Rebecca’s writing process, her expectations for the book, and how she developed the book’s structure (complete with photos of the index-card story board she used to organize the book), in this interview with Nieman Storyboard, from the Nieman Foundation at Harvard and also in The OpenNotebook interview with David Dobbs (which includes photos of her research notes). She talks more about the book’s braided structure in this interview with the Read and Roll Show, where she explains how Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe and the movie Hurricane, about Hurricane Carter the boxer, helped her organize her own material.
- Visit the special features page of this site for photos not included in the book, videos of HeLa cells dividing, the BBC documentary discussed in the book, and more.
- Perfect for classrooms! Check out this reader-generated online Jeopardy! game – you can play with up to 12 teams.
- Read these profiles of Rebecca Skloot and watch or listen to these interviews with her to learn more about her book, her background, her writing process, and more.
- Visit the Frequently Asked Questions page of this site for answers to questions commonly raised by students and teachers.
Photos
Rebecca has spoken about her book at more than one hundred colleges and university nationwide. View the slideshow below to see photos from her talks, many of which feature members of Henrietta Lacks’s family.
Henrietta´s grand daughter Jeri Lacks and her daughters JaBrea and Aiyana talk with students and sign books
Courtney Speed and Bobette Lacks talk with students at Johns Hopkins
Dr. Roland Pattillo talks with students about The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Sonny Lacks and his grand daughters JaBrea and Aiyana talk with students and sign books at Johns Hopkins
Bobbette Lacks and Henrietta´s great grand son talk with students and sign books at Johns Hopkins
Lawrence Lacks with students at Johns Hopkins
Students at Johns Hopkins
Skloot with Duke University student wearing "Henrietta Lacks Fan" t-shirt
Students at UCSB Read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Students at UCSB create an "Identity Tree" using their fingerprints and their cell line names (first two letters of their first and last names, like HeLa for Henrietta Lacks)
Students Examine Live HeLa Cells Through a Microscope
Students at UCSB Read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Students at UCSB create an "Identity Tree" using their fingerprints and their cell line names (first two letters of their first and last names, like HeLa for Henrietta Lacks)
Students at UCSB Read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Students at UCSB Read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot talking with students and signing books at Johns Hopkins
Rebecca Skloot talking with students and signing books at Johns Hopkins
Rebecca Skloot talking with students and signing books at Johns Hopkins
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Rebecca Skloot talking with students and signing books at Johns Hopkins
And click here to see recent photos of Henrietta’s Son, David Lacks Junior, and his daughter Kimberly, talking with high school students in Dayton, Ohio, as part of the cities Big Reads program.
See how other students are interacting with The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks:
- UCSB
- Wisconsin
- St. Bonaventure
- Loudoun Valley’s Battle of the Books
- Connecticut College’s Common Reads
Rebecca regularly visits colleges and universities to talk about The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Visit the Events page of this site to find her speaking schedule, and when she might be appearing in your area.
The Henrietta Lacks Foundation
The Henrietta Lacks Foundation strives to provide financial assistance to needy individuals who have made important contributions to scientific research without their knowledge or consent.
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