News & Features

From Follett: Follett Corporation today announced the establishment of the Follett Knowledge Fund, a capital funding source for new technologies that have the potential to improve and even disrupt the way educational content is delivered and consumed. Follett has committed $50 million to the fund, which complements and extends the company's extensive portfolio of digital solutions and tools.

More than 30 years after it was published, Judy Blume's YA novel Tiger Eyes has been adapted for the big screen. Directed by Lawrence Blume, the author's son, the quiet film stars Willa Holland as Davey and Amy Jo Johnson as her mother, both reeling from the results of a tragic shooting. The gorgeous landscape of northern New Mexico serves as a perfect backdrop to the long-awaited adaptation, also available via video on demand. Kent Turner reviews it for SLJ.

Gamificiation, augmented reality, and transmedia were just some of the hot topics at the 21st Century Children’s Nonfiction Conference, held June 14–16 at the State University of New York in New Paltz.

You’re in a room with 65 teen volunteers waiting to be trained on the Summer Reading Program. You thought of the perfect icebreaker for the group: “What is your favorite memory of the summer reading program?” Crickets... And then it hits you. They don’t have any favorite memories of a summer reading program. They don’t even know what a summer reading program is, save the fact that it’s a volunteer opportunity. Why? Because they’ve never participated in a Summer Reading Program (SRP).

On June 11, The White House honored 12 museum and library “Champions of Change” who are making a difference “for their neighborhoods and for our nation” in a ceremony in Washington, D.C., including 2013 Mover & Shaker Matthew C. Winner, pictured here with his wife, Aimee Winner.

A story of familial bonds in which a 12-year-old girl spends the summer with her grandparents who are harvesting wheat in the Midwest.

Back in January, we had a conversation (in reference to Derf Backderf’s Alex Award-winning My Friend Dahmer) about what makes a graphic novel “nonfiction” and the rigidity of categories like “fiction” and “nonfiction.” A couple of new comments have been added to that thread, so please head over to the above link to read the whole chain, but [...]

Things are wet in NYC these days.  We’ve been experiencing a great deal of rainfall this past spring, a fact that gives me a strange sense of comfort.  I can’t help but think this might be my first year here in town where all the fountains are on in all the parks this summer.  I [...]

The White House’s announcement last week of the ConnectEd initiative, President Obama’s urging of the FCC to overhaul the E-Rate program, is only the first step in what must be a larger, committed effort to fully fund technology in our nation’s schools and libraries, the International Society for Technology in Education says.