Latino Children's Book Awards and Their Presence in Public School Media Centers across the Research Triangle Area of North Carolina.

by Champion, Kathryn E.

North Carolina is a leading state in the changing demographic of the public school student population. In particular, Latino students are increasing in number and schools across the state must address the special needs of this portion of the school population. The school media specialist can serve as a catalyst for acknowledgement of the Latino culture though a strong collection of books. Three children’s book awards were developed in the late 1990s to encourage publication of good Latino materials for library collections: the Pura Belpré, Americas, and Tomás Rivera awards.

This study examines the library collections of twelve elementary schools from four counties in the Research Triangle area of North Carolina with the largest numbers of Hispanic students to determine if and how many of the award-winning Latino books were included. Data collected was based on a list of book titles that have received one of these awards. All twelve elementary schools had fewer than fifty percent of award titles in their collection. Of those titles that were present the majority were in excellent to fair condition.