Since 1981, kids have been saving their coins to shop at their school’s Scholastic Book Fair. A chance to get their hands on the latest in the “Baby-Sitters Club” or the “Captain Underpants” series, the Scholastic fairs are also fundraisers, helping schools earn much-needed cash, classroom and library resources.
But, in 2023, Scholastic found itself in the hot seat when it decided to separate books dealing with race, gender and sexuality into their own collection called “Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice.” Separating the books allowed participating schools to opt out of including the collection in their fairs.
Scholastic explained the collection as a way to help schools deal with the rise of book bans around the country. As The Root recently reported, 2022 saw the highest number of appeals to ban books in the 20 years the American Library Association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom has been keeping track. And as a growing number of books have found themselves in conservatives’ crosshairs, the company thought it was giving book fair hosts what they needed “to navigate legislation and policies.”
But that argument didn’t fly for some, and folks took to social media to share their disappointment, accusing Scholastic of preventing students from having much-needed access to diverse voices.
“Stunned that @Scholastic Book Fairs is self-censoring the books in its “Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice,” which are predominantly by queer, disabled, & Black & brown authors,” wrote author and poet Amanda Gorman on X, formerly known as Twitter. “This is not sharing our stories—it’s treating them as separate but equal.”
All of the heat caused Scholastic to rethink their decision and go back to their mission to help schools share stories that represent all children. And in November 2023, Scholastic reversed course and decided to discontinue the “Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice” collection and deliver all books in the fair to all schools beginning with the Spring 2024 book fairs.
“We have learned that separating out titles or highlighting titles that might make teachers and librarians vulnerable to serious legal and professional consequences is not the answer,” Scholastic said in a statement shared with The Root.