Street Lit in school libraries

K.C. Boyd wrote this morning asking me to help get the word out about announcement of the 2014 Street Lit Book Award Medal (SLBAM) winners.
This award was created by Dr. Vanessa Irvin Morris, author of the Reader’s Advisory to Street Literature and the official press release appears on her Street Literature site.

The young adult literature winner was the Hip Hop Biography Series (Saddleback)

The Street Literature post notes:
This nicely packaged 10-volume series has engaged teen readers throughout the country since its release in early 2013.  Librarians report that this series of 48-paged biographies successfully attracts reluctant readers.
The Young Adult Literature (fiction and non-fiction) honorees were:

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• Grace, Gold, and Glory My Leap of Faith by Gabrielle Douglass
• Way too Much Drama by Earl Sewell
• Butterfly: A novel by Sylvester Stephens

K.C. Boyd, the librarian at the Wendell Phillipps Academy High School, has served on the selection committee for the past four years.
As The Audacious Librarian, K.C. blogs about young adult street lit/urban fiction and shared details of the award in this post.
I asked her to share a little more about the importance of the genre:

Street Literature is a genre that is often misunderstood and feared by many in the library world.  This genre has value and appeals to my students who have been historically been ignored by publishing houses.  The stories are reality based and depict the tales of daily life/struggle of people living in lower-income city neighborhoods.  These stories are authentic, unapologetic and truthful . . . period.
Three years ago, my students were struggling and reading below average, now they are reading on level and above; my school, Wendell Phillips Academy High School has achieved LEVEL ONE status for academic growth within Chicago Public Schools.  This is a WINNING genre for my students!

Her students discuss their honest opinions about street literature in Conversations at the Circulation Desk.
And K.C. shares collection development advice in this presentation, Librarians Guide for Street Literature Collection Development.

Filed under: authors, booklists, books, street lit, YA, YALSA, young adult literature, youth culture