CHICAGO (AP) — Kids are seeing more possibilities in the books they read as authors make a bigger push to reflect the diversity around them. The director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Cooperative Children’s Book Center says racial diversity in children’s books has been picking up since 2014, reversing a 25-year plateau. That continued into 2020 but progress has been slow. Data suggests books about people of color stayed largely the same and there were only slight increases in books written by people of color. Experts say the true effect of 2020 on the children’s book industry may be seen in the years to come.
