President’s Program Welcomes Tracy K. Smith and Jose Vargas

By Wendy Bundy, Clarion University, PA

Author and poet Tracy K. Smith, opening speaker at the June 24 ALA Awards Presentation and President’s Program, feels poems have a unique way of helping people work through obstacles. Although poetry can be very personal and moving for individuals, Smith highlighted how it is a community tool. “I often tell my students who are eager to start the process of becoming poets, that investing in the work of peers can really be like sustenance along the long and meandering path toward publishing your first book.”

Smith was quick to note that most of the resistance to poetry has to do with subject matter. “However, these are conversations that we, as a society, need to be having. They are conversations based in our history. We cannot move forward in society without acknowledging this past and these stories, and poetry is an outlet that allows for multiple stories to be told in one.”

“Poetry focuses on the story, jumping right in from the start,” Smith said. “This is why I selected prose for my memoir instead.” She said she wanted to tell the entire truth, not jumping right into the story or leaping away from it either. Her memoir, Ordinary Light, comes out in September.

Jose Antonio Vargas came to the United States from the Philippines at the age of 12. Now, as an established journalist, he helps people understand why he does not apply for and become a U.S. citizen. It’s a question that he is often asked. The fact that so many people do not understand the process or the obstacles he has encountered gives him cause to continue to tell his story.

Vargas has found that people expect him, as well as other immigrants, to “earn citizenship.” The issue is far more complex. “With the stigma surrounding illegal immigrants, people like me are being detained and deported. We are not being asked to speak at the American Library Association.” His story is relevant and important, but he was advised strongly not to tell it. “After talking to 28 lawyers, all of whom said not to do it, the more they said don’t do it, the more I thought I should do it,” Vargas said. “I outed myself.”

His book, Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen, will be available this fall. “I have never seen a therapist before, and the book was the biggest therapy I could have ever given myself.” This book is not only for him, but also for all those who will learn from his story.

Coretta Scott King Book Awards to Mark 50 Years

In 2019, the American Library Association (ALA) will celebrate the 50^th anniversary of the Coretta Scott King Book Awards. Given annually, the awards serve as a guide for parents, librarians, and caregivers, for the most outstanding books for youth by African American authors and illustrators that affirm African American culture and universal human values.

The Coretta Scott King Book Awards were established in 1969 by Glyndon Flynt Greer, a school librarian in Englewood, N.J.; Mabel McKissack, a school librarian in New London, Conn.; and John Carroll, a book publisher. These three founders envisioned an award that would recognize the talents of outstanding African American authors and encourage them to continue writing books for children and young adults. The award commemorates the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and honors his wife, Coretta Scott King, for her courage and determination to continue the work for peace and world brotherhood.

Winners are selected by the Coretta Scott King Book Awards Jury and announced annually to a waiting national audience at the ALA Youth Awards Press Conference, held on the Monday of the ALA Midwinter Meeting. Award recipients are selected within three categories, including the Coretta Scott King (Author) Book Award, Coretta Scott King (Illustrator) Book Award and Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Award. The awards are sponsored by ALA Ethnic and Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table (EMIERT) and supported by ALA’s Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services (ODLOS).

The first Coretta Scott King Award was presented in 1970 at the New Jersey Library Association conference in Atlantic City, N.J. The award went to Lillie Patterson, author of Martin Luther King Jr.: Man of Peace. In 1974, the committee honored an illustrator for the first time. The award went to George Ford for his illustrations in Ray Charles by Sharon Bell Mathis. Mathis also received the Coretta Scott King Author Award. That year, the Coretta Scott King seal was designed by Lev Mills, an internationally renowned artist in Atlanta, to identify book jackets of award winners.

For nearly half a century, such outstanding African American authors and illustrators as Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Walter Dean Myers, Virginia Hamilton, Jerry Pinkney, and Christopher Paul Curtis have been honored by the ALA as Coretta Scott King Book Award recipients.

In 1979, on the 10^th anniversary of the King awards, the Coretta Scott King Awards Task Force was formed and became a part of the ALA’s Social Responsibilities Round Table with Glyndon Greer as chair. Greer died in 1980, having seen the award succeed as one of ALA’s most prestigious honors. In 1982, the Coretta Scott King Book Awards became an official award of the American Library Association.

Currently the Coretta Scott King Book Award Anniversary Committee is planning 50^th anniversary celebration events to take place during 2019. Additional information regarding Coretta Scott King Book Award 50^th Anniversary activities will be available within the coming weeks at www.ala.org/csk.