With the exception of the National School Library Program of the Year Award, the deadline for AASL awards and grants is February 1, 2014. The National School Library Program of the Year Award deadline is January 1, 2014.

Applications now open include the Innovative Reading Grant ($2,500), sponsored by Capstone, which is designed to fund literacy projects for grades K-9, and the Intellectual Freedom Award, which grants $2,000 to the winner and $1,000 to the school library of the winner’s choice, sponsored by ProQuest, and given for upholding the principles of intellectual freedom as set forth by AASL and the American Library Association (ALA).

With the exception of the National School Library Program of the Year Award, the deadline for AASL awards and grants is February 1, 2014. The National School Library Program of the Year Award deadline is January 1, 2014. All applications will close at 4:30 p.m. CST on the day of the deadline.

Amulet Books, an imprint of Abrams, recently announced that the Splintered story will continue as a trilogy. The sequel, Unhinged, releases in January 2014 and will be followed by the final title, Ensnared, the following year. Readers will be thrilled to see that the love triangle heats up in the second installment and they will have to decide if they are Team Jeb or Team Morpheus. Visit the Unhinged blog for more about the trilogy, and to check out the creepy book trailer!

Students in grades three through eight can enter the Dare to Dream…Change the World Second Annual Writing Contest for Children by creating an original biographical poem and a paragraph about someone who not only dreamed, but took action and made the world a better place. The contest “aims to promote literacy, poetry writing, and nonfiction research while inspiring students to follow their own dreams.”

Entries can be submitted through April 30, 2014. Winners will be announced by June 1, 2014. Be sure to check out the rules and submission information. The grand prize winner will receive $1,500 worth of Kane Miller and Usborne books for a school or community library of their choice. The top 30 entries will be published as a free ebook by sponsor Kane Miller Books.

The contest, cosponsored by Educational Development Corporation, has been announced by Jill Corcoran, compiler and contributing poet to Dare to Dream … Change the World (Kane Miller, 2013), a collection of biographical and inspirational poems for children featuring a culturally diverse mix of subjects ranging from Jonas Salk to Steven Spielberg, and from Christa McAuliffe to Michelle Kwan. A free, downloadable curriculum guide is available on the contest and publisher websites.

Pin It to Win

Teachers have until September 27, 2013 to enter Raytheon’s “Pin It to Win It” sweepstakes on Pinterest “that encourages knowledge sharing and promotes science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education.” The contest is part of Raytheon’s MathMovesU initiative, which aims to inspire student interest in STEM subjects and support teachers by providing easy access to STEM education resources.

Educators must create a back-to-school Pinterest board, re-pin and share creative STEM education content, such as inventive experiments or lesson tips, to the MathMovesU “Back-to-School” Pinterest board. Twenty-five winners will be randomly selected to receive a MathMovesU bag filled with classroom supplies, such as calculators, rulers, protractors, and compasses.

Picture Book Art

From September 17, 2013 through March 24, 2014, the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA, will feature an exhibit of artwork from Eric Carle’s new picture book, Friends (Philomel). The title has a release date of November 19, 2013, and showcases Carle’s signature tissue-paper collage artwork. It tells the story of a little boy who braves harsh weather, tall mountains, and long distances to reunite with his best friend who moves away. Visit the Museum’s website for hours and admission fees.

“Friends was inspired by many of my own friendships,” says Carle. “One that I had as a three-year-old boy, another as a six-year-old when I was taken by my parents to Germany, and another as a young man when I arrived back in the United States with my portfolio in hand. I have always believed that friendship is very important. I know it was for me as a child. I can still remember my strong attachments and feelings for my friends when I was a boy.”

Canadian Children’s Lit Awards

The Canadian Children’s Book Centre (CCBC) has announced the finalists for its seven major children’s book awards: TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award, Prix TD de littérature canadienne pour l’enfance et la jeunesse, Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award, Norma Fleck Award for Canadian Children’s Non-Fiction, Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People, John Spray Mystery Award, and Monica Hughes Award for Science Fiction and Fantasy. The winners will be announced at the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Awards and Prix TD de littérature canadienne pour l’enfance et la jeunesse in Toronto on October 22 and in Montreal on October 29.

The finalists for the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award ($30,000) are: Kids of Kabul (Groundwood; ages 11 Up) by Deborah Ellis; One Year in Coal Harbor (Groundwood; ages 9–13) by Polly Horvath; Susin Nielsen’s The Reluctant Journal of Henry K. Larsen (Tundra; ages 11 Up); The Stamp Collector (Fitzhenry & Whiteside; ages 8 Up) written by Jennifer Lanthier and illustrated by Francois Thisdale; and Virginia Wolf (Kids Can, ages 5–10) written by Kyo Maclear and illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault.

The Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award finalists are: Mr. King’s Things (Kids an; ages 3–7) written and illustrated by Genevieve Cote, Mr. Zinger’s Hat (Tundra; ages 4–8), The Stamp Collector (Fitzhenry & Whiteside; ages 8 Up) written by Jennifer Lanthier and illustrated by Francois Thisdale; Uncle Wally’s Old Brown Shoe (Orca; ages 4–8) written and illustrated by Wallace Edwards and Virginia Wolf (Kids Can, ages 5–10) written by Kyo Maclear and illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault.

The Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People ($5,000) finalists are: A Call to Battle (Scholastic Canada; ages 10–14) by Gillian Chan, The Lynching of Louie Sam (Annick Press; ages 12 Up) by Elizabeth Stewart, Making Bombs for Hitler (Scholastic Canada; ages 9–14) by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch, Amy McAuley’s Violins of Autumn (Walker; ages 12 Up), and Yesterday’s Dead (Second Story Press; ages 10–14) by Pat Bourke.

The finalists for the John Spray Mystery Award ($5,000) include: Becoming Holmes (Tundra; ages 11–14) by Shane Peacock, Devil’s Pass (Orca; ages 12–14) by Sigmund Brouwer, Neil Flambe and the Tokyo Treasure (S & S; ages 8–13) written and illustrated by Kevin Sylvester.

A complete list of finalists in all the categories can be found on The Canadian Children’s Book Centre’s website.

For the first time, TD Bank Group is partnering with CBC Books to present the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Fan Choice Award. Young readers will be asked to pick their favorite book from the shortlisted TD Award titles in an online poll starting on Monday, September 9. The book with the most votes will win, and one entrant will win a trip to Toronto to present the award at the ceremony on October 22.

From the Des Moines Register:

Area residents can hatch some great projects in the new Maker Space at Kirkendall Public Library — the first of its kind in central Iowa.

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The space is officially called Hatch and will include a 3-D printer, video and audio editing equipment, an image scanner, a traditional sewing machine and a serger, plus tools for digitizing VHS, vinyl and audio cassettes. The equipment will be ready for the public to use Sept. 23.

“The name Hatch comes from ‘hatching an egg,’ because we’ll be hatching creativity,” Willeford said. “We’ve seen an increase in people using new technology, like e-readers, so we wanted to give them the opportunity to use new technology that they might not have at home, like a 3-D printer.”

Read the Complete Article

Thanks: Matt Weaver

Nearly 10,000 students at 20 local schools now have access to The Indianapolis Public Library’s collection of nearly two million items as part of the Library’s growing Shared System, an interlibrary collaboration that provides online circulation services and joint access to the catalogs and collections of member institutions.

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Begun in 1995, the Shared System allows students to use their library cards to request materials from the Indy Library’s online catalog and from their own school library collections, and provides a delivery system that transports items between Indy Library branches and the schools. The Library also performs processing and cataloging services for the cooperative. It is the only such system in the United States that uses this cooperative model between schools and public libraries.

The Shared System includes a combination of private, public and charter schools along with a state school (Indiana School for the Deaf), and two local art museums (Eiteljorg Museum and the Indianapolis Museum of Art).

“This is a unique partnership that helps the Library support Marion County students by giving them more tools to access information and the resources they need,” said Sarah Batt, the Library’s Shared System Manager. “Schools can leverage their scarce resources by sharing the materials they purchase with each other.”

See Also: A History of the Shared System (via IPL)

See Also: Shared System Info Page (via IPL)

The Institute of Museum and Library Services

“Over the past half century, video games have transformed our society. Museums and libraries struggle with the challenges of ever-changing technology to preserve that cultural legacy,” says ICHEG’s director Jon-Paul Dyson. The grant has enabled the Center “to test the functionality of approximately 7,000 games in the collection and ensure that we have all the necessary hardware and software to run the programs,” Dyson says.

“When we test the games we also capture 10–20 minutes of video of the game play for each game. This program of video capture has emerged as an important preservation tool.”

Dyson also notes that the grant is helping the Center pioneer methods that other institutions can use to preserve video games and record their impact on society.

Follett

“We implemented the process for removing the older Follett Digital Reader and TextFlow Reader apps and activating the new Follett Enlight app,” says Britten Follett, the company’s communications manager. “Currently the Follett Enlight app is appearing in GooglePlay, however we are waiting on the Apple Store to refresh in order for the Follett Enlight app to appear [there].”

Although some school librarians had expressed dismay this week—on Twitter and elsewhere on social media—after encountering problems accessing the new app, Follett confirms that the app is live on both online stores. Those having trouble locating it on iTunes, she notes, can use this direct link:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/follett-enlight-k-12-edition/id692783324?mt=8

Enlight is designed to provide schools with universal access to “quality K–12 econtent in a consistent virtual learning space that promotes critical thinking skills through reading, studying, and note taking,” the company says. Enlight also allows students to add notes and highlights to ebooks, and gives students access to chosen dictionaries based on reading levels.  Beyond Enlight, the new release of FollettShelf includes two new modules designed to connect econtent to all parts of a school district:  FollettShelf Classroom Connections, and FollettShelf District Manager.

“On the heels of new partnerships with Random House and Hachette Book Group, this latest release…gives schools access to thousands of popular ebook titles for K–12 students in a classroom-ready reading environment,” adds Tom Schenck, Follett School Solutions’ president, COO.

According to U.S. Census Bureau statistics released today, college enrollment in fall 2012 plunged by half a million (467,000) from one year earlier. This decline, which includes both graduate and undergraduate enrollment, follows a period of substantial growth ─ 3.2 million ─ between 2006 and 2011.

These statistics come from School Enrollment: 2012. As the nation’s students begin a new school year, the Census Bureau releases its annual set of tables on the characteristics of children and adults enrolled in school at all levels ─ from nursery to graduate school. Among the characteristics examined are age, sex, race, Hispanic origin, nativity and foreign-born parentage.

This decline in college enrollment was driven by older students ─ that is, those 25 and older. Their enrollment fell by 419,000, while the enrollment of younger students declined by 48,000.

Hispanics didn’t follow the trend, as the number enrolled in college grew by 447,000 from 2011 to 2012. Meanwhile, non-Hispanic white enrollment declined by 1.1 million and black enrollment by 108,000. From 2006 to 2012, the percentage of all college students who were Hispanic rose from 11 percent to 17 percent. The percentage who were black also rose (from 14 percent to 15 percent), but the percent of non-Hispanic white students declined from 67 percent to 58 percent.

“This increase in the number of Hispanics enrolled in college can be attributed to the combination of an increase in the adult Hispanic population and their climbing likelihood of being enrolled,” said Julie Siebens, a statistician in the Census Bureau’s Education and Social Stratification Branch.

The tables released today cover specific topics such as enrollment by grade, the attendance status of nursery school students and characteristics of their mothers, the type of school college students attend (two-year, four-year, etc.) and whether they attend full or part time, students taking vocational courses and the enrollment status of recent high school graduates. The information was collected in the October 2012 Current Population Survey.

Also released today was School Enrollment in the United States: 2011, a report that examines the characteristics of people enrolled in school at all levels using statistics from the Current Population Survey, American Community Survey and federal sources outside the Census Bureau. It covers some topics not typically covered in Census Bureau reports, such as Head Start, charter schools, home schooling and receipt of financial aid.

Although most of the statistics are national-level, some state-level data from the American Community Survey are presented. Updated 2012 American Community Survey statistics on school enrollment covering states and all geographic areas with populations of 65,000 or more will be published in September.

Other national highlights from the 2012 Current Population Survey tables:

–In 2012, 78 million people, or 26.4 percent of the population 3 or older, were enrolled in school.

–In 2012, there were 19.9 million college students, including 5.8 million enrolled in two-year colleges, 10.3 million in four-year colleges and 3.8 million in graduate school.

–In 2012, there were 4.2 million students enrolled in private elementary and high schools (first through 12th grade), down from 4.8 million in 2005.

–Non-Hispanic white children in 2012 comprised 53 percent of elementary school students, down from 58 percent in 2005. Hispanic children made up 24 percent of elementary students in 2012, up from 20 percent in 2005. Black children comprised 15 percent of elementary students in 2012, down from 16 percent in 2005.

–Students who were born in another country or whose parents were foreign-born comprised 32 percent of all those enrolled in school at all levels in 2012.

–While most students are under 25, there were 804,000 students age 50 and older enrolled in schools at all levels in 2012.

Direct to Data Tables

School Enrollment in the United States: 2011

Krahnke will use the grant to purchase books to give away as library card registration incentives and for the library’s monthly teen book club, while Rérat’s goal is to partner with the Jasper County (MO) Juvenile Detention Center and update the center’s library.

Funds raised through Books for Teens will be distributed to institutions in communities with a high level of poverty, where librarians and library workers will purchase and distribute new books, encourage teens to get library cards and provide teens with reading-focused events and activities. Visit the Books for Teens website for complete information on grant requirements.

Capstone distribution center employee with book shipment

The tornadoes decimated the city’s schools and completely destroyed its libraries. When Sharon Hagge, Capstone’s Distribution Center Coordinator, learned of the destruction in Moore, she knew her department would want to pitch in to help. They have been busy organizing the shipment, but the schools were only recently prepared to receive the large donation. “We know there’s a lot more work to be done, but we hope that Moore’s first school year after the storms is a happy and safe one,” Hagge said.

Each year Capstone donates more than $1 million in books worldwide, and will continue to help rebuild Moore’s libraries in particular with its “Buy a Book, Give a Book” promotion through its trade publishing program, Capstone Young Readers. The publisher donates one book to the Moore schools for every book purchased through its website. Consumers can simply use the Promo Code “MooreRelief” when placing an order online.

One week after facing an official GOP reprimand for failing to oppose Common Core, Sen. Bill Holtzclaw is calling upon state educators to ban a novel used in conjunction with the national standards.

Holtzclaw objects to “The Bluest Eye,” Toni Morrison’s first novel, being included on high school reading lists. He said was unaware whether the book was in high school libraries, but that he would also support removal from school libraries.

“The book is just completely objectionable, from language to the content,” said Holtzclaw, who points out the novel includes depictions of incest and child molestation.

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Holztclaw said a constituent contacted him last week about “The Bluest Eye” in relation to Common Core. Holztclaw said he has since contacted State Superintendent Tommy Bice. The Alabama Department of Education was crafting a response and did not immediately reply to inquiries about Holtzclaw’s concerns.

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Holtzclaw said he was not initially focused on removing the book from school libraries, but would probably support removal from library shelves.

Read the Complete Article 

See Also: Some Parents Want ‘The Bluest Eye’ Banned From High School Reading List (KRDV-Denver; July 23, 2013)

See Also: Timeline Entry for 1994: The Bluest Eye (via ALA OIF)

UPDATE  9/5/2013 “Morrison’s ‘Bluest Eye’ Joins Wide Range of Books Challenged in Alabama Schools” (via School Library Journal)

The Revolution of Evelyn Serrano (Scholastic; Gr 6–10) by Sonia Manzano won the 2013 Americas Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature, established by the Consortium for Latin American Studies Programs (CLASP) “to encourage and commend authors, illustrators, and publishers who produce quality children’s and young adult books that portray Latin America, the Caribbean, or Latinos in the United States, and to provide teachers with recommendations for classroom use.”

In Manzano’s novel, 14-year-old Evelyn Serrano lives in Spanish Harlem in 1969. The family is of Puerto Rican descent, and the teenager struggles with her own sense of identity and what it means to be Puerto Rican in El Barrio.

Honorable Mention went to Martin de Porres: The Rose in the Desert (Clarion; Gr 2–4) written by Gary D. Schmidt and illustrated by David Diaz.  The picture-book biography tells the story of the life of the first black saint of the Americas who was born in 1579 in Lima, Peru.

There were also three Commended Titles: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe (S & S; Gr 9 Up) by Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Drummer Boy of John John (Lee & Low; PreS-Gr 3) written by Mark Greenwood and illustrated by Frané Lessac, and In Darkness (Bloomsbury; Gr 9 Up) by Nick Lake.

Titles published in 2012 were considered for the 2013 award. Books are judged for their literary quality; cultural contextualization; exceptional integration of text, illustration, and design; and potential for classroom use. The award presentation will be held on October 5, 2013 at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.

Dot Day

Celebrate International Dot Day with its creator, Peter H. Reynolds, at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, MA, on September 15, 2013 from 1–4 pm EST. The event was inspired by Reynolds’s book for young readers, The Dot (Candlewick, 2003), that “encourages children and adults to unleash their inner creativity through reading, art, and more.” International Dot Day has been celebrated in classrooms and libraries since 2009.

Events at the Carle include a book signing with Reynolds, a storytime, screening of the three films (Weston Woods) in Reynolds’s “Creatrilogy” series (The Dot, Ish, and Sky Color). All the activities are free with Museum admission.

“What began as one little dot on the pages of a book has grown into a movement that has countless people fearlessly expressing their creativity—not only on International Dot Day, but now all year long,” noted Reynolds.

Six weeks after cautioning it could shutter 22 public libraries, Miami-Dade County has found a way to keep all 49 facilities open at least some of the time, offering stripped-down services.

In all, 169 librarians would lose their jobs by Oct. 1, and libraries would operate about three-quarters of the hours they do now, Mayor Carlos Gimenez informed county commissioners late Friday

More in the Complete Article

UPDATE: The Miami Herald has published an op/ed by the Mayor of Miami-Dade, Carlos Gimenez.

Here’s what he has to say about libraries.

All libraries will remain open: We finalized a two-year plan that will keep all libraries open. Additionally, we have reduced the number of layoffs from 251 to 169. However, there will be reduced staffing and fewer service hours — 1,624 per week versus 2,016. To move toward a sustainable library system, we must take a transformative look at how our system operates and is funded. Dissolving the current restrictive library tax district to provide for countywide funding would allow for the flexibility needed to respond to the entire community’s priorities. We will work with community partners to study and assess our options.

We need to learn more details about precisely which jobs will be cut.

Does librarian mean professional librarian with MLS/MLIS degrees or all library employees. Regardless, while the number of people losing jobs has been reduced to 169 from 251 it’s still quite disturbing on multiple levels.

We shared some comments about school librarians losing jobs in Harrisburg, PA (all librarians let go) and NYC (reduction in the number of librarians in schools) in this post.

Is a public or school library really a public or school library without professionals building collections (print and ebooks for adults and children), selecting electronic services (from research databases to 3D scanners), training library users (e.g. digital literacy, web search), etc.

As we pointed out a few weeks ago on infoDOCKET, the library community has done a poor job of explaining what librarians do (both in and out of the library facility) and why they are more valuable today than ever before.

We must do a better job marketing ourselves and promoting our skills and abilities and demonstrating (this is key) why they are important. If we don’t do this no one else will. This needs to be done in a community wide-effort (regardless of library type) but also by each one of us, individually, with those we come in contact with including both friends and family.

More about this in a future post.

Interactive Comics

Thirty-two titles from the “DC Super-Pets,” “DC Super Heroes: The Man of Steel,” “Superman,” and “Batman” series are now available as interactive ebooks from Capstone. An additional 28 titles will be released in the fall. There’s a one-time fee for “DC Super-Pets” interactive ebooks ($31.99 ea.) and “DC Super Heroes” ($33.99 ea.), which grants access to unlimited circulation for all students 24/7 in school, at home, or on any mobile device. “Our DC Comics brand of full-color chapter books offers readers the perfect introduction to DC Comics characters and are among Capstone’s most successful and best-selling series,” noted Matt Keller, Capstone’s Chief Marketing Officer. “Librarians can expand their digital collection with the titles kids love without having to worry about hidden fees or circulation limits.”

Math Challenge

WGBH Educational Foundation’s Innovation Math Challenge is for anyone who wants to create fun and engaging math educational media—educators, student teams, gamers, or programmers. Applicants can submit entries of games, math videos, infographics, or manipulatives. The contest challenges individuals or teams to design and create a web-based digital resource between two and six minutes in length related to middle school math and connected to the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics. The entry should be “engaging, rich in content and context, and go beyond strictly procedural teaching.” The deadline for submission is November 22. Check out the website for more information and contest rules. Up to 100 winners will each receive $1,000.

New York City school librarians are fighting back.

A group of librarians and parents held a rally Wednesday morning to protest the city’s request for a waiver from state librarian staffing requirements.

Standing on the steps of Tweed Courthouse, the Department’s downtown Manhattan headquarters, librarians said they couldn’t just be replaced by a computer in a classroom.

“A lot of the kids – every librarian can tell you this – they all want to run to Google” said Karen Levy, who has worked for more than 20 years at Christopher Columbus High School. Librarians said they help students find better research databases and steer them toward reliable information.

Read the Complete Article

See Also: City Schools Are Quietly Using Fewer Librarians (via WSJ; 8/11/2013)

See Also: Pennsylvania: All Gone! Harrisburg School Library Staff Eliminated With Recent Layoffs (8/13/2013)

Nominate your peers, staff, and friends to join the company of past honorees, including Jennifer Velasquez, Teen Services Coordinator, San Antonio PL (2011); Renee Grassi, Youth Services Librarian, Glencoe Public Library, IL (2012); Corey Wittig, Digital Teen Librarian, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, PA (2012); Lindsey Tomsu, Teen Librarian, La Vista Public Library, NE (2013), and many more!  Movers and Shakers 2014 will celebrate the new professionals who are moving our libraries ahead. The next round of 50+ winners will be featured in the March 15, 2014 issue of LJ and celebrated at an awards luncheon in Las Vegas during ALA Annual 2014. The deadline to submit is November 2^nd so don’t wait. Click here for submission information.

Teen Read Week is an national literacy initiative of the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), a division of the American Library Association. It’s aimed at teens, their parents, librarians, educators, booksellers and other concerned adults.

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who last month warned that 22 of the county’s 49 public libraries could be shut down this fall due to deep budget cuts, announced Thursday that his administration now expects to shutter only four.

[Our emphasis]  The dramatic reduction, while welcome news to library supporters who have campaigned to keep the facilities open, still comes with plenty of pain. Libraries across the board will likely shorten their hours and be staffed by fewer librarians.

Though the number of closures has shrunk to less than 10 percent of the existing libraries — compared to nearly half under the worst-case scenario — the number of proposed layoffs has not gone down by the same proportion. The latest estimate has 192 library workers losing their jobs, down from 251.

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The list won’t be finalized until commissioners vote on the 2013-14 budget after two public hearings in September.

Read the Complete Article

See Also: We posted earlier this week that the Harrisburg Public Schools no longer have librarians on staff and volunteers will trained to “check out and organize books and other materials.”

Will a similar scenario also be case in Miami-Dade? What about all of the other things librarians do in both school and public libraries? Additional comments here.

Penguin Young Readers Group Award
Online applications for the 2014 Penguin Young Readers Group Awards are being accepted by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) and the Grants Administration Committee. Up to four children’s librarians working at a school or public library can receive a $600 stipend to attend their first American Library Association (ALA) Conference to be held in Las Vegas, June 26–July 1, 2014. To apply, you must be a personal member of ALSC and ALA, have less than 10 years but more than one year experience as a children’s librarian, and never have attended an ALA Annual Conference. Applicants will be judged on their involvement in ALSC and other professional/educational associations, new programs or innovations started in the library, and library experience. Check out all the requirements and apply by October 18, 2013.

Coming to a theater near you
The much-awaited film adaptation of Artemis Fowl is finally being developed by the Walt Disney Studios. The screen play is being written by Michael Goldberg (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) and Harvey Weinstein will produce it. The film will be based on the first two titles in the series by Eoin Colfer (Artemis Fowl and Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident). The release date has not yet been announced. Artemis Fowl is 12 years old, a genius, a millionaire, and a criminal mastermind. The series has more than 21 million copies in print. “This is a special project for me because my children absolutely love this book,” notes Weinstein.

Kwame Alexander’s He Said/She Said
In advance of the November 2013 publication of his new young adult novel, He Said/She Said (HarperCollins), author Kwame Alexander is offering a free beach-themed toolkit for libraries and schools. The kit includes activity suggestions for beach-themed book release parties. The book is a teen love story that also deals with social issues. There’s also a contest related to the release of the book geared towards high school students between the ages of 15 and 19. Here are the categories: Best Social Issue Poster Message by a Girl, Best Social Issue Poster Message by a Boy, Best He Said/She Said Book Review by a Girl, Best He Said/She Said Book Review by a Boy, Best He Said/She Said Book Cover Design by a Girl, Best He Said/She Said Book Cover Design by a Boy, Best He Said/She Said Book Illustration by a Girl, Best He Said/She Said Book Illustration by a Boy, Most Effective Social Media Engagement by a Girl, Most Effective Social Media Engagement by a Boy. Prizes include autographed copies of the book, gift cards, and more. Be sure to check out the contest rules and complete an entry form. Entries must be received by December 20, 2013, and winners will be notified by January 17, 2014.