Diversity Initiative

The CBC Diversity initiative was founded in 2012, as part of the Children’s Book Council’s commitment to promoting diverse voices in literature for young people. We believe that all children deserve to see their world reflected in the books they read. We recognize that diversity takes on many forms, including differences in race, religion, gender, geography, sexual orientation, class, and ability.

In addition to championing diverse book creators and books, the CBC Diversity Initiative strives to open up the publishing industry to a wider range of employees through internship programs at the CBC office.

The CBC also compiles extensive diverse reading resource lists from publishers and trusted sources for use by teachers, librarians, booksellers and parents.

CBC Partner Resources: #FReadom Coloring Pages

In 2021, several Texas librarians launched the #FReadom movement to fight book banning. With the approval of Becky Calzada and Carolyn Foote, the CBC has produced these 6 different #FReadom coloring pages for kids of all ages to print, color, and post. Click on the image below to download them all!

Read more at www.txfreadomfighters.us.

CBC Diversity Outstanding Achievement Awards

The initiative sponsors the CBC Diversity Outstanding Achievement Awards. It is given annually to professionals or organizations in the children’s publishing industry who have made a significant impact on publishing diverse titles, their promotion, diversity in hiring and mentoring, plus efforts that create public awareness about the importance of diverse voices.

People and organizations are nominated by publishing professionals, booksellers, teachers, and librarians each year and winners are selected by the CBC Diversity Committee.

Check out the award winners and the videos of the events:

• The 3rd Annual Diversity Awards have been announced!
• 2019 Diversity Award winners and 2019 event video
• 2018 Diversity Award winners and 2018 event video

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More About Our Resources and How to Get Involved!

Diversity-based content is regularly contributed to the CBC Blog including exclusive author guest posts and interviews with book creators, as well as posts from diverse children’s publishing insiders. Our Inclusivity Resources highlight book lists and other information of interest about diversity in children’s books.

The retired Tumblr blog and archived Diverse YA and Children’s Books Goodreads list feature many still relevant resources but are no longer updated.

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