CHICAGO – Eleven-year-old published author Kamryn Smith stood before a room of young writers at the Obama Presidential Center this month, not as a guest speaker reciting lessons from adulthood, but as proof that the children in front of her could become authors today, not someday.

Smith served as a featured youth author and mentor during the Book Making Workshop, marking the Obama Presidential Center’s first literary program since opening. For a campus built to inspire the next generation of leaders, Wanda Lee Florestine, creator of the workshop, said there was no more fitting way to begin than with a child leading other children.

The significance of the setting was not lost on those in the room. The Obama Presidential Center was designed as a space where young people could see possibility modeled in front of them — a place meant to cultivate the next generation of changemakers rather than simply commemorate the last one. Choosing a children’s bookmaking workshop as the campus’s first literary event signaled an intention to start that work early, with the youngest voices in the community rather than the most established ones.

Throughout the workshop, Smith guided participants ages 8 to 12 through the process of writing and creating their own books, walking them step by step through developing an idea, shaping a narrative and putting it into a finished, bound product they could hold in their hands. She encouraged the children to see storytelling not as a distant, grown-up achievement, but as something available to them right now. Several children later shared video testimonials describing how meeting Smith changed the way they saw themselves — many said the experience pushed them to start writing books of their own, some sketching out ideas before the workshop had even ended.

“I wanted them to know that just because they’re kids doesn’t mean their story doesn’t matter,” Smith said. “Everybody in that room has a story worth telling. I got to see them figure that out for themselves, and that was the best part — watching them believe it.”

Florestine says that moment of recognition — a child watching another child succeed — is precisely what makes youth-led literacy programming so effective. Representation, she notes, does more than inform; it makes ambition feel achievable. When the person modeling success is close in age to the child watching, the distance between “someday” and “now” collapses.

That philosophy sits at the center of Smith’s own mission. She is the author of multiple children’s books, including “Be Free: Just Do It Your Way,” and has built a growing platform as a national youth literacy advocate, speaker and young entrepreneur. Rather than treating literacy as a technical skill to be mastered, Smith frames it as an act of self-discovery — a way for children to find out that their voice carries weight in the world.

Smith was accompanied at the event by her father, educator and literacy advocate Kenneth “Coach Jo Jo” Smith, whose decades of work in youth education have shaped much of the family’s approach to literacy and mentorship.

“When a child sees another child succeed, something shifts — their dreams suddenly feel believable,” the elder Smith said. “That’s what literacy is really about. It’s not just teaching kids to read; it’s helping them discover that their voice has value, and that their story has the power to change someone else’s life.”

For the children in attendance, the workshop offered something rare: an invitation to become creators of stories rather than only consumers of them. Participants left with pages of their own writing, drafts of ideas, and — according to several testimonials — a new belief that authorship was within reach. For many, it was the first time an adult, or in this case another child, had treated their story ideas as worth finishing rather than simply worth having.

Wanda Lee Florestine, creator of the workshop, said the event reflects a broader shift in how literacy programming is being approached nationally: fewer lectures about the importance of reading, more direct experience creating something of one’s own. That shift matters most for children who don’t yet see themselves reflected in the books on their shelves. Smith’s presence, she said, turned an educational workshop into a moment of genuine inspiration for the children who attended, many of whom left describing themselves, for the first time, as writers.

As the Obama Presidential Center continues to build out its programming, Smith’s participation is expected to be remembered as a marker of the kind of storytelling the campus hopes to cultivate — youth-driven, community-centered and rooted in the belief that leadership can start at any age.

Watch “These Kids Met an 11-Year-Old Author… and Everything Changed” on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBIjpXiGDts

About Kamryn Smith

Kamryn Smith is an 11-year-old published author, national youth literacy advocate, speaker and young entrepreneur. She is the author of multiple children’s books, including “Be Free: Just Do It Your Way,” which was featured as part of the HBCU Classic in 2023, and serves as co-founder of the Hall of Fame Authors initiative, which works to inspire children around the world to read, write and believe in themselves. Smith also made history alongside her sister as the first children to hold a book signing at the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame induction ceremony. Through her books, speaking engagements and mentorship work, she is building a platform dedicated to showing young people that their stories — and their voices — matter now, not someday. She continues to travel and speak to young audiences nationally, encouraging children to see themselves not just as future leaders, but as leaders already.

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