By Deborah Ford-Salyer
It’s the most wonderful time of the year...No. Not winter break. It’s Award Season! In just a matter of weeks, our annual Literary Event will be held completely online. The 2021 Youth Media Award announcements will take place on Monday, Jan. 25, 2021, at 8 a.m. CT during the ALA Midwinter Meeting and Exhibits virtual conference. Libraries, schools, and book lovers worldwide are welcome to follow results by visiting ALA’s streaming platform at http://ala.unikron.com, or ALA’s social media channels, including Facebook, YouTube, or Twitter, by following hashtag #alayma. (You do not have to be an ALA member or conference registrant to watch.)How can you prepare? I’ve spent the last year+ getting ready for the Big Day. I’ve read reviews. Opened boxes of arcs from publishers. Been grateful for curbside pick up at my local public library. This year, I’ve bought tons of books from a newly discovered local treasure, Cover to Cover Books, a children’s bookstore. I’ve read for hours from downloaded PDFs from NetGalley and Edelweiss. I’ve made lists, charts, and piles of books, trying to do the impossible—predict the winners. I still have some reading to do.
Who will win? This year we have six books with (at least) six stars. These stars are from the traditional list of professional journals—School Library Journal, The Horn Book, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, Booklist, and The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books.
Six Stars
Class Act by Jerry Craft
Fighting Words by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
Honeybee: The Busy Life of Apis Mellifera by Candace Fleming and Eric Rohmann
I Am Every Good Thing by Derrick Barnes and Gordon C. James
The List of Things That Will Not Change by Rebecca Stead
The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh by Candace Fleming
In the Five-Starred Category, there are 24 titles and in the Four-Starred Category, there are over 50 titles. Last year’s Newbery winner, New Kid, had four stars; it also won the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award. The Caldecott winner, The Undefeated, earned five stars; it also won The Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award. A. S. King’s Dig, winner of the Printz, received four stars from the Big Six journals.
Remember, however, that highly starred books don’t always bring home the gold. Some are not eligible, as their creators live outside the States. There are dozens of other reasons—some of which we will never know as these committee YMA winners are never allowed to discuss specifics of their decisions. They keep their secrets to the grave.
Now what? I’ve made a TeachingBooks list of the highly starred titles. Browse the list and think about doing the following:
Duplicate 2021 ALA YMA Highly Starred Titles into your own TeachingBooks account.
Filter the list by your school’s grade levels and delete titles that are not age-appropriate.
Go through the list, marking what you have. It’s likely many of them will win an honor or appear on the ALA Notables lists. Sixty-seven of these titles are already on best lists from other associations like NSTA and NCSS.
Download the list as a spreadsheet to create a shopping wish list. Be ready to add “surprise” titles on January 25.
Get your PO or credit card ready. Newly crowned titles quickly run into backorders—especially for a lesser-known title.
Sign up for email at Perma-Bound, Bound to Stay Bound, Follett, JLG, and Mackin who will all send out flyers with pricing information. Watch your email for them to arrive shortly after the announcements.
Contact your book vendor asap for best availability. Be sure your sales reps know how to find you.
While you wait...Read what you have. Order copies you don’t have. Borrow audio, ebook, and print copies from your public library. Listen to the Meet-the-Author Recordings (24 titles) and Audiobook Performances (66) on TeachingBooks. Watch the book trailers. (There are 23.) Learn how to pronounce the author’s and illustrator’s names—62 creators. Share the resources with your community by using the red share tool. Talk it up. Set your alarm for the Big Day. Plan a Zoom Party to celebrate the announcements.
What will win? Only the Shadow knows. (Haha.) I have no idea. I have my hopefuls, but mostly I just think it’s important to stay current in this field. Know the awards. Meet the debut creators. Use TeachingBooks to learn as much as I can about a book so that I can better direct colleagues and readers to those just-right titles.
I’m just excited about the journey. I’ve seen lives changed because of what wins—for creators and readers. It elevates the chance that a kid will have access to a book that changes them. The diversity awards allow more opportunities for a reader to see themselves in a book. A book that might give them courage and hope. A book that helps them know they are not alone.
As librarians, we have the privilege of creating the menu for our students. Our due diligence is worth it when you think about the impact our choices can make.
In my next posts, we will consider some of the awards contenders. What are your hopefuls? What are you doing to prepare for the YMA announcements?
Deborah Ford-Salyer
is a long-time lover of children’s and YA lit. Her seminars and workshops have created piles of books to be read on nightstands from the east coast to the west. She’s also the CA Implementation Specialist for TeachingBooks and a senior presenter at BER.org.
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