From: Ginny Moore Kruse <gmkruse>
Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2002 12:40:36 -0600

The ALSC, YALSA & ALSC/REFORMA Award Committees responsible for the Awards announced on Jan. 21 in New Orleans are committees with new memberships and new chairs each year. As someone wrote before, they're separate committees. They meet separately, and they don't confer, collaborate, or communicate. All discussions and balloting of each committee are confidential. That's how it's possible for the fine book "Carver" to have been selected by both the Newbery and the Coretta Scott King Award Committees. And no one knows why the Printz Committee didn't select it, either. Only the Printz Committee members know, and no one can tell.

That's only one reason why it's essential for each committee to have an have exacting, detailed award manual for guidance. Not guidance about which book or genre to choose - nothing like that - but, rather, guidance about terms, definitions and procedures. Each committee's charge brings its own complexities.

For example, the Batchelder Committee has the flexibility to decide not to name an award winning publisher/book in any given year. Why? Because - regrettably - there are so few books of substantial length published and eligible for this significant award each year. See the essay "Observations about Publishing..." in each issue of
"CCBC Choices" for details each year. (March 9th is the pub date in 2001. Stay tuned for details as to how to get a copy of "CCBC Choices 2002," if you don't automatically receive one as a member of the Friends of the CCBC.)

However, the Newbery and Caldecott Award Committees do not have that flexibility. They must choose a winner. Period. In each committee, the winning book must have eight first place votes from the fifteen-member committee numbering fifteen members, and it must be eight points ahead of the next book with votes. So the winner is not a compromise, it isn't everyone's third choice. That's why multiple ballots are often necessary. The mathematical consensus process used by these and many other award committees really works, which is why we use it during various CCBC book award discussions. We want participants here at the CCBC to experience this type of balloting consensus.

Thanks, Jane, for sharing information about the Newbery and Caldecott Award Manuals. Betty Peltola's work on those manuals is still appreciated within ALSC, and someone is contacting her probably even as I write this message to invite her to look over
(not revise) the work of others on one or two of the manuals.

I was involved for only a short while in drafting the manual for the relatively new Pura Belpr? Awards given collaboratively by ALSC and REFORMA. There are complexities for each award that require extensive attention to detail, and this one has many. My virtual hat goes off to Yolanda Bonitch and Eliza Dresang for all they've done to create a working draft of that manual.

As chair of the 2003 Laura Ingalls Wilder Award Committee, I'm newly aware of the importance of having an up-to?te manual of definitions, terms, and procedures. The 2003 Wilder Award Committee is grateful to Pat Scales, Kathy East, and the many others who've contributed to the working draft of the manual guiding us as we seek to honor someone for the his/her contribution to children's literature.

I, too, find it easy to second-guess the committee choices, and it's interesting to read everyone's comments so far. I hope we'll hear from others, too, this week. I share Dean, Robin, and Denise's disappointment that Amber Was Brave, Essie Was Smart wasn't named within the Newbery roster. Along with Linda I had hoped that Fighting Ruben Wolfe would have been within the Printz listing somewhere. I'm very disappointed not to see Tonya Bolden's Tell All the Children Our Story : Memories and Mementoes of Being Young and Black in America (Abrams); Love That Dog by Sharon Creech (HarperCollins); and Lois Ehlert's Waiting for Wings (Harcourt) on any of several award and best-of-the-year lists where these extremely accomplished, distinctive books absolutely belong.

I could make a much longer list of books I wish were within the finals. That wouldn't mean that I'm not extremely pleased with the actual outcomes, because I am. I just happen to have more than a few favorites, and there wasn't room for each of them to show up. However, there is more than one way for me to "vote" for them. We each can "vote" for our favorites.

How? We can each tell others about our favorites, and why. (Hey, that's what we did during December and what we're doing right here, isn't it?) We can find ways to remember our favorites when we're selecting personal gifts. We can teach these books to children or college students. We can use them in library programming, and put them on lists of recommended books. We can check them out of libraries and share them with children and teenagers so they can experience each. Most of all, we can have the most important vote ourselves. Right now we can order and buy even more than one copy of our favorites - personally - to help these favorites remain in print long enough for their unique pleasures to be realized by a substantial number of readers. Even one year isn't enough for most books. - Ginny

Ginny Moore Kruse gmkruse at education.wisc.edu Cooperative Children's Book Center www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/ A Library of the School of Education, University of Wisconsin - Madison
Received on Wed 23 Jan 2002 12:40:36 PM CST