The Yoto Carnegies Announce Media Partnership with Award-Winning Children’s Newspaper First News

yotocarnegies.co.uk | #YotoCarnegies23 | @CarnegieMedals

Tuesday 24 January 2023: The Yoto Carnegies are delighted to announce the award-winning children’s news provider First News as their official media partner for 2023.

First News will work with the Yoto Carnegies team throughout the Awards cycle to create bespoke content for young readers to engage with the authors, illustrators, and books celebrated by the Awards.

The Yoto Carnegies are the UK’s longest running and best-loved children’s book awards, recognising outstanding reading experiences created through writing and illustration in books for young people. The Awards aim to spark a lifelong passion for reading by connecting more children with the books that will change lives.

The shadowing scheme attracts and engages with thousands of children and schools as they ‘shadow’ the judging process, debate the books, and decide their Shadowers’ Choice winners from each Medal shortlist.

Editor-in-Chief of First News, Nicky Cox MBE, said: “We are delighted to be partnering with The Yoto Carnegies, who share our passion for getting young people reading, and are looking forward to keeping our readers updated on the Awards throughout the year. First News is at the forefront of ensuring children have access to reliable, trustworthy and age-appropriate news curated especially for them and gives children a voice about the issues they care about. While children make up 27% of the world’s people, they are 100% of the future.”

CILIP Chief Executive, Nick Poole said: “We’re thrilled to be partnering with First News for The Yoto Carnegies this year. They have always been fantastic supporters of the Awards but following our brand refresh, it felt like the perfect opportunity to come together to inspire children and foster a love of reading. With an engaged young readership across the country and shared goals of fuelling curiosity and critical thinking, there is a lot of synergy in our ambitions, and we’re looking forward to working with their talented team.”

KEY DATES FOR THE YOTO CARNEGIES 2023:

Wednesday 15 February 2023: Longlist announced

Friday 17 March 2023: Shortlist announced, and Shadowing begins

June 2023: Yoto Carnegie Winners announced

– ENDS –

For further information on The Yoto Carnegies 2023 please visit: www.yotocarnegies.co.uk    

#YotoCarnegies23 | @CarnegieMedals

For media and interview requests, please contact:

Annabelle Wright or Sabina Maharjan at ed public relations on
annabelle@edpr.co.uk or sabina@edpr.co.uk or 020 7732 4796.

NOTES TO EDITORS:

About The Yoto Carnegies

• The Yoto Carnegies celebrate outstanding achievement in children’s writing and illustration respectively and are unique in being judged by librarians.
• The Yoto Carnegie Medal for Writing is awarded annually to a children’s book author whose writing creates an outstanding reading experience. It was established in 1936 in memory of the Scottish-born philanthropist, Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919).
• The Yoto Carnegie Medal for Illustration, established in 1955, is awarded annually to a children’s book illustrator whose artwork creates an outstanding reading experience.
• Each year thousands of reading groups in schools and libraries in the UK and overseas get involved in the Awards, with children and young people ‘shadowing’ the judging process. They read, discuss and review the books on the shortlists, get involved in reading related activity in groups, and vote for their favourite books to win to win The Yoto Carnegie Shadowers’ Choice Medals for Writing and Illustration.
• In 2022, Katya Balen won both the Yoto Carnegie Medal and the Carnegie Shadowers’ Choice for October, October. The Yoto Kate Greenaway Medal – now named the Yoto Carnegie Medal for Illustration – was won by Danica Novgorodoff for Long Way Down and Mariachiara Di Giorgio was awarded the Greenaway Shadowers’ Choice for The Midnight Fair.

About First News

• First News is the UK’s number one children’s newspaper, with a readership of over 2.6 million, including 7,500 subscribing schools.
• It is a multi-award-winning publication, trusted by parents, endorsed by teachers, and loved by children.
• Expertly written by award-winning journalists, First News takes the fear out of sensationalised stories providing a balanced and truthful view of the world, carefully and sensitively explaining context and background.
• With daily online content and weekly delivery to your doorstep, First News provides factual, impartial news, sports, science, and entertainment from the UK and around the world.
• Improving news literacy is at the heart of First News, whether through our acclaimed news service or our award-winning news-based learning tools and resources for schools and educators.
• You can find out more about First News at: www.firstnews.co.uk  

About CILIP, the library and information association

• CILIP is the leading voice for the information, knowledge management and library profession. Our goal is to put information and library skills and professional values at the heart of a democratic, equal and prosperous society.
• CILIP is a registered charity, no. 313014. The Youth Libraries Group (YLG) is a special interest group of CILIP who work to preserve and influence the provision of quality literature and library services for children and young people, both in public libraries and school library services.
• YLG has 12 regional committees covering all of the UK, and each committee advertises and democratically recruits a judge to represent them on the panel of judges. Each judge serves a two-year term and each year the panel is a unique mix of new and experienced judges led by the Chair of Judges. Following the independent diversity review of the Awards, CILIP introduced a co-opting procedure so that if this recruitment process does not result in a sufficiently diverse and representative judging panel, up to two judges will be co-opted to join the panel.

About Yoto

• Yoto is the audio platform that kids control. Our audio players let kids safely explore their favourite stories, music and more without a screen.
• Inspired by Montessori principals, Ben Drury and Filip Denker founded Yoto in 2017. The very first Yoto Player launched on Kickstarter, then sold out in 2019. The second generation Yoto Player was designed with renowned design agency, Pentagram, and launched in early 2020. 
• Yoto Player has won awards and accolades from critics and toddlers alike. TIME Magazine even named it one of the Best Inventions of 2020.
• Yoto Mini – our portable audio player – launched in late 2021 and was awarded a D&AD Pencil in 2022.
• Yoto’s platform features original content alongside audio licensed and co-created with partners. These include PRH, Macmillan, Sony, Disney, LEGO, Roald Dahl Story Company, HarperCollins,