Giving Tuesday! SCBWI Impact & Legacy Fund, Awards & Grants, etc.

Happy Thanksgiving to all those who celebrate. 

To close out our month of activism, community action, and celebration, I want to invite you to check out some of SCBWI's charitable programs, awards, and grants as well as our book ban champions. In the spirit of gratitude, and with Giving Tuesday around the corner, please consider donating to help the KidLit community survive and thrive.

Impact and Legacy Fund

The SCBWI Impact and Legacy Fund, launched in 2022, is a division of SCBWI created to support the charitable activities and community purposes of SCBWI. Its programs and initiatives are not limited to SCBWI members but are available to the entire children’s book community.

The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators Impact and Legacy Fund is committed to creating, implementing, and supporting programs that center children’s books and their creators as a driving force behind equity, literacy, and freedom of expression for readers and storytellers alike.

Amber Brown Grant

The Amber Brown Grant commemorates author and beloved school speaker Paula Danziger. One school is awarded each year with an author or illustrator visit and new books to continue Paula’s love of connecting children with creative influences.

Disability Fund Application

The SCBWI Disability Fund gives grants to disabled members for anything that would help them create children’s literature. For nonmembers with disabilities, the funds may support memberships and/or registration to events.

Emergency Fund

The SCBWI Emergency Fund provides a grant of up to $1,500 to a member for anything that would help them create children’s literature. For nonmembers with disabilities, the funds may support memberships and/or registration to events.

Banned Book Resources

Here are some resources to continue the fight beyond Banned Book Week!

• Banned and Challenged Books Bookshop 
• A expansive list of banned books that you can purchase to help support creators

• SCBWI Banned Book Video Playlists
• Check out SCBWI's Banned Book Playlist, full of panel discussions with industry professional, censorship activists and more!

• Consider joining organizations that are on the front line of the fight!
• Unite Against Book Bans
• Pen America
• Authors Against Book Bans
• National Coalition Against Censorship

Banned Books Week 2024 Resources and Book Love

Banned Books week in the USA is happening now (Sep 22-28, 2024) and there's so much you can do to get involved and help make sure that diverse books are available to the young readers who need them!

One great example is author Charlotte Sullivan Wild (Love, Violet - illustrated by Charlene Chua, FSG), who is creating Instagram slides for the week featuring queer picture books, on a theme each day. Here's Charlotte's first #QueerBookLove #RainbowBookLove post

Another cool initiative to check out is one I've created with Tasslyn Magnusson, WE ARE STRONGER THAN CENSORSHIP which aims to put the brakes on the runaway train of book banning by buying and donating two books for every one challenge or ban.

There are also a lot of great events this week celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of diverse books, including 25 panels* offered by EveryLibrary Live! Banned Books Week Fest and this Banned Books week event (both in-person and live-streamed) with Judy Blume.

PEN America is hosting live events in New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Coral Gables, Florida, Austin and Dallas, Texas, Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Farmington, Utah. SAGE is hosting a Banned Books Week panel*, and the American Library Association has a list of banned books week events here.

There are lots more suggestions for things you can do to fight book banning, including BE STRONG: Things You Can Do About Book Banning, the American Booksellers Association's Right to Read Handbook, and getting involved with Sep 28, 2024 Let Freedom Read Day.

Illustrate, Translate, and Write On,
Lee

*full disclosure: these include some online events where I am moderating or a panelist.

Batchelder Award Criteria Change: Name the Translator

Since 1968, the Mildred L. Batchelder Award has garlanded the "children's book considered to be the most outstanding of those books originating in a country other than the United States and in a language other than English and subsequently translated into English for publication in the United States during the preceding year."

It is the Newbery for translated children's books. 

And the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) has adjusted its criteria to recognize translators.

At its meeting in January 2022, the ALSC board approved the following change to the Batchelder Award submission criteria: 

"The translator(s) shall be named on all titles submitted for consideration. The translator(s)' name(s) shall appear, at minimum, on the title page along with the author(s)' name(s), and ideally the translator(s)' name(s) shall appear on the cover along with the author(s)' name(s) as well."

This change requires publishers to name the translator on/in children's books submitted for the award—as has been urged for all translated books by (most recently) the #TranslatorsOnTheCover campaign, boosted by SCBWI.

This change is expected to help normalize naming the translator of a book wherever the author is named, as is set forth by the Authors Guild and PEN America. This is the convention in a number of countries already, and US publishers are increasingly observing this standard. 

Besides crediting, a range of translator rights have lately been identified as needing attention. Royalties and retention of copyright for the translation stand to help all translators and are musts to make the field more inclusive.

First, however, translators must be named and seen. The ALSC board saw us. 

Read the press release about the revised criteria. 

Download a list of past Batchelder Award and Honor winners (PDF).

Disclosures: The 2022 Batchelder Award went to the Yonder imprint of Restless Books for Temple Alley Summer by Sachiko Kashiwaba, illustrated by Miho Satake, in my translation. This was a massive, will-always-remember-where-I-was surprise and honor. Restless Books named me in both of the ways mentioned in the revised criteria. / I submitted a stakeholder comment in support of the criteria revision as SCBWI TC. The Batchelder Award selection committee and the ALSC board are distinct entities.

My name is Avery Fischer Udagawa, and I have been honored to blog global reads this month. I serve as SCBWI Translator Coordinator (see Translation in SCBWI) and SCBWI Japan Translator Coordinator (see Ihatov).