Every two years, the Australian Children’s Literature industry waits to see who will be announced as the next Australian Children’s Laureate by the Australian Children’s Laureate Foundation. The laureate for 2024-2025 has recently been announced, and it is none other than Sally Rippin, whose theme for her time as laureate is All Kids Can Be Readers.
Sally’s mission is to help all kids to be readers, as she believes that all kids can be readers. As someone who found learning to read easy. But she knows this is not the case for everyone – and some people will need extra support for a variety of reasons: dyslexia, inability to read traditional books due to visual impairment, and many other reasons that can affect how people read. This shouldn’t mean people can’t enjoy stories, and people should be able to access books in a way that works for them – whether it is traditional books, ebooks, audiobooks or braille books. There are books for all types of readers from comic books to novels – we just need to find the right book for every reader.
Sally’s hope as Laureate is to see that all children get supported access to reading – in a way that suits them, and during the next two years she will be travelling around the country ad meeting with teachers, librarians, and kids to talk about sharing stories and supporting kids who find reading difficult.
It is about reading accessibility – about making sure that everyone can read what works for them and what they like. It is about seeing that diversity of books extends to format and delivery as well as content, and about making reading fun.
Previous Laureates have included:
- Gabrielle Wang (2022–2023)
- Ursula Dubosarsky (2020–2021)
- Morris Gleitzman (2018–2019)
- Leigh Hobbs (2016–2017)
- Jackie French (2014–2015)
- Alison Lester and Boori Monty Pryor (2012–2013)
Let’s help Sally make the most out of her two years in this position!
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