Gather, a Kidlit Podcast

Program Director Alison Green Myers opened this #HFGather with an inspiring mini-keynote celebrating this creative life, with echoes back to the Highlights Foundation's first summer writers' workshop at the Chautauqua Institution and reflections on moving the summer camp experience to the Barn at Boyds Mills.

Alison said that creative magic (in the form of rich and righteous lectures, generous mentorship, and community) continues in our Summer Camps today.

After this powerful beginning, Highlights Foundation Marketing Director Christina Ousouljoglou took over. She explained how while inspiration can remind of us why we do this hard job of creating for kids, being together is practically how we get through the ups and downs of this industry (and this life).

She then introduced three panelists: Daria Peoples, Harlan DeChamps and Judie Offerdahl. All three are alums of Summer Camp, and shared their experiences of togetherness with the group: mentorship, community, and support–all gleaned from Summer Camp and beyond.

Alison Green Myers celebrated our 2023 scholarship program, and answered questions, with some special guests: 2022 scholarship recipients Christiana Doucette, Sid Champagne and Jenniffer Jones and faculty member Sarah Aronson.

https://www.highlightsfoundation.org/2023/01/31/hfgather-2023-scholarship-celebration-and-information-session/

At our latest #HFGather, authors Ally Malinenko, Amber McBride and Linda Epstein shared an honest and thoughtful conversation about writing about trauma and grief for kids and teens sensitively and honestly.

Resources Mentioned: https://www.highlightsfoundation.org/22304/hfgather-writing-about-trauma-and-grief-for-kids/

Illustrators Pat Cummings, Shadra Strickland, Xindi Yan and Rudy Gutierrez joined us to talk about this important topic! Pat moderated a lively conversation, asking the others to talk about the kinds of work they've done and to share some of their experience and wisdom. A few things talked about:

• Targeting your portfolio towards the kind of work you want to get
• What does your agent/rep/legal team look like outside of kidlit?
• Keeping the rights to your work
• Negotiating joint permission with the client -to use your work
• Publicizing your work outside of kidlit
• And more!

The Highlights Foundation's Alison Green Myers and Alex Villasante had a wonderful conversation with educator, advocate, and activist Julia Torres: Empowering Readers and Reader Choice. Among the things they discussed:

• The importance of encouraging young people to recommend books to each other–it's more powerful than having adults recommend books to them.
• Giving young people the honor of being quiet and listening to them, and see what they tell you about what they've read or what they'd like to read. We want them to feel joy in their own choices.
• We need to rework our whole idea of what learning looks like. As we are facing the worst teacher shortage that's ever happened, maybe there is opportunity now to do things differently. Why don't we adopt the tools that will give young people more agency with their reading?
• Educators should not be afraid of other reading modalities, like manga, graphic novels and fan fiction.
• Publishers and organizations need to think about real-world ways to connect young people with authors.
• Picture books are not just for very young kids – they are quite nuanced and can be used with older children too, if we can de-stigmatize reading them.
• Letting go of the idea that allowing young people to choose the books they want to read would mean they aren't reading rigorously enough, that they might be missing key educational points.
• Regarding the current book-banning discussions, Julia says she would like to hear directly from young people, instead of listening to adults talking about it. She things that these book banning conversations are taking place in primarily white suburbs, whereas "people from the margins have had their choices censored for a very, very long time."

Jas Hammonds, Anna-Marie McLemore, NoNieqa Ramos and Em Dickson joined us for a PRIDE Celebration of Stories. They had a wonderful conversation with Highlights Foundation team members Alison Green Myers and Alex Villasante about:

• Supporting stories you love and getting those books into kids' hands
• Their careers in the kidlit LGBTQIA+ space
• Bringing things out into the open and going "anywhere we want" in terms of genre
• Helping each other find safe spaces in publishing
• Having the wonder and freedom to write what you NEED to write
• The unique challenges of gender diverse authors in kidlit

For the full list of book recommendations, visit our website: https://www.highlightsfoundation.org/21683/watch-our-pride-celebration-of-stories/

Faculty Sarah Aronson answers questions and shares what makes the Whole Novel Workshop so special.

At the latest Ask-Me-Anything, we answered some general questions before moving to breakout rooms with Sarah Aronson (Whole Novel Workshop) and Pam Cummings and Harold Underdown (Crash Course in Children's Publishing) This video shares the content from before and after the breakouts.

It also includes Harold Underdown and Pat Cummings answers about the upcoming the Crash Course in Children's Publishing and the Illustrator's Edition of the Crash Course.

We celebrated Children's Book Week (and Teacher Appreciation Week!) with an #HFGather featuring author Sarah Aronson talking with Amy Guglielmo, Creative Director for Reading Rainbow Live. The two had an enthusiastic conversation about:

• Amy's work as an artist, art educator and Creative Director of Reading Rainbow Live!
• Sarah's experience of having her book Just Like Rube Goldberg featured on the show
• How books are selected for the show; finding books that have been overlooked. Find out more at https://readingrainbowlive.com/
• Opening doors to a creative life without expectations
• Where they find inspiration
• Embracing your writing the way kids do, without worrying about perfection or your audience
• Finding inspiration in collaboration
• Sharing your excitement about something with kids–enthusiasm is contagious!

Padma and Margarita converse about poetry, their stories, and their mutual respect for one another's craft.