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Kia ora koutou We are incredibly excited and proud to let you know that Alan Dingley will be the next Te Awhi Rito Reading Ambassador for children and young people. Alan is a passionate School Librarian at Palmerston North Intermediate Normal School and SLANZA member. You may have watched his presentation, This Quiz is Lit, at the SLANZA Whakaohooho Online Conference 2021 or heard him as the voice behind SLANZA Sessions Podcast.  Te Awhi Rito Reading Ambassador supports and champions the importance of reading in the lives of young New Zealanders, their whānau and communities, increasing visibility and awareness of reading across all sectors, helping to create a nation of readers. Alan will bring impressive experience, skills, and knowledge to the kaupapa of creating readers:
“I am so humbled to be chosen as the next Te Awhi Rito New Zealand Reading Ambassador and follow the wonderful mahi and impact Ben has made. It’s a brilliant opportunity and to have been selected is just such an amazing feeling. Our sincere congratulations to Alan for being selected for this prestigious role. We know he will be a fabulous advocate for promoting reading, School Librarians, and libraries. “I believe my strength will be reading engagement, on-the-ground work with children and young people, and building and strengthening community connections.”
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 Register events now and unleash the power of poetry across Aotearoa on 25 August National Poetry Day is scheduled for 25 August 2023, and as its administrators open registrations for events and seed-funding, they are inviting organisers across the motu to join in to unleash the uplifting power of poetry. Robin McDonnell, CEO of Poetry Day sponsor Phantom Billstickers, says that when company founder Jim Wilson witnessed the healing power of poetry in the early 2000s, he started putting poems on posters to share with others. “It was balm and a joy for him then and still is now, and we’d like to think that it can help the nation heal as we recover from more than three very tough years. Never has poetry been so important for so many reasons,” he says. Aotearoa’s much-loved one-day nationwide celebration of poetry – now in its 26th year – is gearing up for its biggest and most joyous range of events yet, and is encouraging regional organisers to think about all the ways that poets and poetry can soothe, delight and rejuvenate as they plan their 25 August activities. In 2022, in the first in-person Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day in three years, more than 150 events were staged across the motu, bringing together established and emerging poets, young writers and voices, and poetry enthusiasts of all ages. They celebrated on beaches and street corners, in old churches, pubs, libraries, universities, museums, hospitals, bookshops, bowling alleys and even in national parks. NPD’s national coordinator Erica Stretton encourages organisers to register early to access seed-funding, promotional materials, guidance, and to be included in the heavily promoted official calendar of NPD 2023 events. Interested organisers will find registration documents, templates and a full range of useful planning and promotional resources on the NPD website at www.poetryday.co.nz. Applications for seed funding close at 5pm on 1 June 2023. The official Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day 2023 calendar will be announced on 2 August. For further information contact NPD national coordinator Erica Stretton at [email protected] and to keep up with plans for NPD 2023, follow NZPoetryDay on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Released on behalf of the New Zealand Book Awards Trust Te Ohu Tiaki i Te Rau Hiringa by: Belinda Cooke, [email protected], tel: 021 481044. National Poetry Day was established in 1997 with a mandate to celebrate discovery, diversity, community and pushing boundaries. It is a one-day nationwide poetry event extravaganza held annually on a Friday in late August. Phantom Billstickers has been assisting New Zealanders to express themselves since 1982. From the very beginning they’ve supported home-grown talent alongside their commercial campaign work, actively promoting New Zealand music, art, poetry and culture through a network that now numbers 6500 framed street posters countrywide. The New Zealand Book Awards Trust Te Ohu Tiaki i Te Rau Hiringa was established as a charitable trust in 2014 to govern and manage the country’s two major literary awards – The Ockham New Zealand Book Awards and the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults – as well as Phantom Billstickers National Poetry Day, and to ensure their longevity and credibility.   The Books Back Better fundraising initiative is being launched today to help the recovery of school libraries affected by Cyclone Gabrielle.
A group of local Hawkes Bay authors, school librarians and booksellers, led by Mary-anne Scott, have teamed up with SLANZA (School Library Association of New Zealand Aotearoa) and Booksellers Aotearoa NZ to create the Books Back Better project. Books Back Better is a project to collect monetary donations from our wider communities around the motu to buy Booksellers Tokens and distribute these to kura/schools, Kohanga Reo and Kindergartens affected by the recent cyclone Gabrielle in Aotearoa New Zealand. Mary-anne Scott, Hawkes Bay author, is leading the Books Back Better group. “A well-stocked, library should be the beating heart of any learning environment for our tamariki. Books Back Better aims to restock flooded school libraries after Gabrielle. Monies raised will provide book tokens so the affected libraries can be filled with books best-suited for their readers.” Our SLANZA National Executive had been discussing ideas about how we best to support school libraries around the motu that had been impacted by Cyclone Gabrielle when Mary-anne phoned me with a desire to support affected school libraries, so it was a no-brainer that we do all we could to get behind a locally driven project”, says Sasha Eastwood, school librarian at Manchester Street School and current President of SLANZA. “The tokens will give schools agency to purchase their own books with their community needs in mind. We hope these books will give comfort to akonga/students as school communities work through recovering from the devastating damage of recent events.” Booksellers Aotearoa were also approached by Mary-anne and were keen to be involved. “The devastation of Cyclone Gabrielle has had impacts throughout New Zealand’s book-loving community, including several of our members.” says Dan Slevin, Booksellers Aotearoa CEO. “By channeling these generous donations through discounted Booksellers Tokens, our association can make a contribution to those schools, kohanga and kindies that have to rebuild their collections, and also support our members operating in affected communities in Northland, Auckland, Bay of Plenty, Tairāwhiti and Hawkes Bay.” People can donate via the SLANZA website. Donations will be used to purchase Booksellers Tokens which will be distributed to kura/schools, kindergartens or Kōhanga Reo in Aotearoa New Zealand affected by Cyclone Gabrielle and who fit the project criteria via an application process. These tokens will enable the affected kura/schools to purchase new books from local booksellers to replace those damaged. Booksellers Aotearoa are supplying the tokens at a 20 percent discount off face value. Join us today by donating to Books Back Better. |
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