Janice Taheera Harper
Her life’s work joined literacy, African American children’s literature, curriculum, and community service. The books she preserved extend that commitment across generations.
A scholar committed to children and community
Janice Taheera Nichols Harper was a Brooklyn educator, literacy scholar, curriculum specialist, and founder of Harper Educational Support Services. Her work centered the learning lives of children and the power of culturally grounded reading.
She earned a B.A. in Psychology from Brown University in 1987, followed by an M.A. in Curriculum and Teaching in 1998 and an Ed.M. in Curriculum and Teaching in 2000 from Teachers College, Columbia University.
Teaching, literacy, and institution building
Harper taught at P.S. 44 and P.S. 145 in Brooklyn and founded Harper Educational Support Services, an educational consulting practice serving public and private schools and community organizations in Brooklyn, Washington, D.C., and Atlanta.
Her work included individualized reading and mathematics programs, multicultural reading and after-school initiatives, staff development, community education forums, student writing contests, and an award-winning pilot reading program connected to the Brooklyn Children’s Museum. She also launched an alliance with Spelman College that prepared students as service leaders for a community literacy project.
A wider educational reach
Her teaching and speaking reached national and international audiences. She traveled to South Africa as a delegate in the People to People Program and later presented at an International Reading Association conference. Her professional affiliations included the National Council of Teachers of English, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, the International Reading Association, and the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
Across these roles, Harper treated literacy as a public responsibility: a way to strengthen children, families, schools, and community memory.
Provenance and Intellectual Lineage
The Janice Taheera Harper Collection preserves books that reflect her scholarly interests and commitment to Black literature and education. Within the collection, ownership evidence connects selected volumes to Adelaide E. Simms of Brooklyn, a friend and travel companion of Black labor organizer, Pan-Africanist, and internationalist Vicki Garvin.
That chain of ownership matters because it documents Black women not only as writers and scholars, but also as readers, collectors, teachers, and caretakers of Black intellectual life.
Biographical facts are drawn from the family’s memorial program for Janice Taheera Nichols Harper and the collection documentation retained by Akoma Coffee & Books.