SLJ Staff

SLJ columnist Pat Scales will receive the 2023 Roll of Honor Award; 2021 School Librarian of the Year Amanda Jones is writing a book about her experience standing up to book banners; Follett to host ReadingCon 2023; and new offerings from Gale and EBSCO in this edition of News Bites.

National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman's poem from President Joe Biden's inauguration has been restricted to older grades in one Florida school district; New Jersey legislators introduce law to prohibit book banning based on "partisan or doctrinal reasons”; and more in Censorship News.

The lawsuit against Escambia (FL) County School District includes authors David Levithan, George M. Johnson, Ashley Hope Pérez, and Kyle Lukoff as plaintiffs. In other censorship news, a judge removed parent groups from another Florida lawsuit; titles were taken off the shelves in North Carolina and Pennsylvania, and more.

The Children’s Book Committee at Bank Street College of Education announced the winners of the Josette Frank Award, the Flora Stieglitz Straus Award, and the Claudia Lewis Award; ALA honors Jewish librarian Susan Kusel with Equity Award; NCAC opens submissions for its young filmmaker contest; and more in this edition of News Bites.

Parents in Pickens County, SC, along with the NAACP, are suing the district and charging that the removal of Stamped is a violation of their children's First Amendment rights; a Nebraska high school librarian resigns in protest over a new book policy; book banners threaten publishers and public library funding; and more.

The Bank Street College of Education’s Center for Children’s Literature has announced the 2023 winners of the Irma Black Award and Cook Prize, which went to Bathe the Cat by Alice B. McGinty, illus. by David Roberts and Anglerfish: The Seadevil of the Deep by Elaine M. Alexander, illus. by Fiona Fogg, respectively.

Community members without children in the schools won't be able to challenge books in one Tennessee district; Iowa tries to define "sex act;" and Maia Kobabe speaks with PEN America about Gender Queer, young readers, and the firestorm that came long after the graphic novel was published.

On the occasion of receiving the 2023 Margaret A. Edwards Award honoring his significant and lasting contribution to writing for teens, Jason Reynolds took the reins on SLJ's Instagram. Here's the full AMA, your feel-good watch of the day.

Censorship remains the focus of SLJ readers, as ALA's Most Challenged Books and restricted access to library databases lead our most popular content, alongside Refreshing the Canon recommendations in partnership with NCTE.