Matt de la Peña and Christopher Paul Curtis Create SCBWI Scholarships for IPOC Women
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SCBWI is proud to announce the creation of two new scholarship awards for SCBWI members to attend the international Winter and Summer Conferences. Four scholarships will be given in total. The two scholarships for the Los Angeles Summer Conference are sponsored by author, SCBWI Board member, and Newbery Award recipient Matt de la Peña; the two scholarships for the New York Winter conference are sponsored by Newbery Award winning author Christopher Paul Curtis. Both of these awards are for Indigenous and People of Color who identify as women.
All four winners of the two awards will receive an expense paid trip to one of the two SCBWI conferences, as well as two follow-up mentorship conversations with an industry professional. All expenses such as travel and hotel will be included, as well as a $250 stipend for additional costs such as home or child care.
SCBWI IPOC members can apply for the Matt de la Peña award by clicking the link
here
.
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Introducing SCBWInvite:
Your Community at a Glance
by Lin Oliver
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Lin Oliver speaks to other SCBWI members at a book launch event
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Welcome to SCBWInvite, the newest member benefit we’ve added to the ever growing list of ways SCBWI can serve you.
SCBWInvite, debuting on our website on
May 15
, is a comprehensive listing of events hosted by SCBWI members all around the world. The events will be organized by location, date and type of event, and made available to SCBWI members and the public. For writers and illustrators, SCBWInvite will give you the opportunity to invite members to attend your book event, whether it be a launch, a presentation, a speech, a signing or a virtual online event. For all the rest of us, it gives us a chance to attend events, to show up for our colleagues and support their creative dreams. In short, SCBWInvite gives us another way to be present and participate in each other’s success.
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Spark Gallery Live on SCBWI.org
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The first ever SCBWI Spark Gallery debuted on the website on April 15. This collection features member books that were independently published in 2018 and submitted to the Spark Award.
Click here
to browse through over 150 vibrant new books, including easy links to buy and learn more. The gallery, which received publicity through SCBWI social media channels earlier this month, will remain live for the rest of the year.
Next year, the application for the Spark Award will be electronic, allowing us to automatically enter all of the submissions in the gallery.
Click here
for information about how to submit an indie book to the 2019 Spark Awards.
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LA19 Conference in High Demand
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This year’s Summer Conference takes place
August 9
through
12
at the JW Marriott in downtown Los Angeles. Reservations have been pouring in since registration opened on April 25, and many options are close to full capacity. Over 600 attendees (and counting) have registered. And of course, spots are filling up for the highly sought after Writer’s Intensive, the Illustrator’s Intensive and the Pro Forum on Monday, August 12.
The 2019 Summer Conference is expected to be a landmark event. It features a whopping 72 breakout sessions, plus keynote presentations from
Mem Fox
,
Meg Medina
,
M.T. Anderson
,
Renée Watson
,
Christian Robinson
,
Raul the Third
,
Yuyi Morales
,
Darcey Rosenblatt
, and
Anna Shinoda
. The conference also includes mainstage panels dedicated specifically to picture books and alternative publishing options as well as panels of agents and editors who will offer insight direct from the publishing trenches. The full conference schedule and information on accommodations, intensives, and consultations can be found
HERE.
We hope to see you there!
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Lee Bennett Hopkins Announces Winning Poet
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The winner of the Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award is HIDDEN CITY: POEMS OF URBAN WILDLIFE by
Sarah Grace Tuttle
, illustrated by Amy Schimler-Safford (Eerdmans, 2018).
Celebrated poet and anthologist Lee Bennett Hopkins describes his selection:
In this stunning debut, illustrated with extraordinary collage paintings, Tuttle explores where nature thrives in cities.
“A dandelion…opens its yellow face/to the sun-/growing up wild/at the base/of a bus-stop bench”; “At night, snails/ ooze from under/ pots, rocks, porches, leaves” and “garden snakes sun themselves/by a graffitied wall”.
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A Recap of the 2019 Kweli Conference
by Tammy Brown
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Kweli held their Fourth Annual Color of Children’s Literature Conference on April 6 in New York City with an enthusiastic group of about 250 writers, illustrators, and translators who reveled in a conference that was for them and created by people like them.
The keynote speakers and panelists were a mix of industry luminaries and new voices. Leading off the proceedings was the opening keynote, “What is Your Verse?” by New York Times best-selling author Samira Ahmed, who talked about how Kweli is “home” to many IPOC in the publishing industry. This Conference provides a place where “code switching is not an anthropological study,” and that “telling stories binds us together,” which means “your verse makes America sing.”
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Just Announced Emerging Voices Winner Finds Agent
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5 Tips for Choosing a Writing Conference
by Samantha Clark
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Writing conferences have become a cottage industry, with more and more springing up all the time run by organizations and even individuals. Educational events like conferences provide fantastic opportunities for children’s book authors and illustrators at all levels, but how do you make sure you’re getting your money’s worth?
Here are 5 things to look for:
Quality of Faculty
– Let’s face it, you don’t go to a conference for the coffee. Before you register for any conference, spend time checking out the faculty. Do they do work that you admire? Is there a mix of speakers from the publishing and creative sides of the business? Can you be sure that they can teach as well as they can create?
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SCBWI Exclusive with...
Jennifer March Soloway
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Jennifer March Soloway is an associate agent with the Andrea Brown Literary Agency. She represents authors and illustrators of picture book, middle grade, and young adult stories. She enjoys all genres and categories, such as laugh-out-loud picture books and spooky middle grade adventures, but her sweet spot is young adult. A suspense junkie, she adores action-packed thrillers and mysteries. Throw in a dash of romance, and she’s hooked! But as much as she loves a good thriller, she finds her favorite novels are literary stories about ordinary teens focused on family, relationships, sexuality, mental illness, or addiction. Regardless of genre, she is actively seeking fresh new voices and perspectives underrepresented in literature. Prior to joining ABLA, Jennifer worked in marketing and public relations in a variety of industries, including financial services, health care, and toys. She has an MFA in English and Creative Writing from Mills College and was a fellow at the San Francisco Writer’s Grotto in 2012. To learn more about Jennifer, follow her on Twitter, @marchsoloway, and find her full wish list at
www.andreabrownlit.com
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Draw This! is our monthly prompt word for illustrators.
Congratulations to the April winners! The April prompt word was
"Bloom"
Click
HERE
to view the April Gallery
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May's prompt word is:
"Alone"
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Want to see your face in
Insight
? Send your photos to
faces@scbwi.org
or post on twitter using the tag
#facesofscbwi
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SCBWI Arizona illustrators Lynne Avril, Molly Idle, Stevie Lewis, Mikela Prevost, and J
uana Martinez-Neal
.
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Amal Karzai and Aram Kim at the SCBWI Long Island Illustration workshop
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Board member Pat Cummings signs her book
Trace
at the Kweli Color of Children's Literature Conference
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SCBWI members congregate at the Southern Kentucky Writers Conference
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