Warwickshire pupils choose their own winner
Warwickshire pupils who shadowed the recent Carnegie award for children’s fiction disagreed with the national judges and chose their own ‘winner’.
Twenty secondary schools signed up with Warwickshire County Council’s Schools’ Library Service to shadow the Carnegie Medal 2010, alongside the national panel of judges.
“This year there were eight shortlisted books to tackle,” said Warwickshire Schools Library Service Manager Stella Thebridge. “A tough assignment for anyone in an eight-week period, but even more so for busy Year 8 and 9 pupils with a heavy load of homework at the same time.”
During the judging process, on June 18, shortlisted author Helen Grant spoke to the young readers about her first novel The Vanishing of Katharina Linden at a special event in the Bridge House Theatre at Warwick School.
The 20 schools taking part assembled at Avon Valley School in Rugby on June 24 - the day of the national Carnegie Medal 2010 announcement - to simultaneously cast their final votes, using an instant electronic voting system.
The Warwickshire voters did not choose the ultimate national award winner - Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book - but had their own clear favourite. They picked Patrick Ness’ The Ask and the Answer, the second book in the ‘Chaos Walking’ trilogy, and deemed by our voters to be a great stand-alone page-turner.
Warwickshire has its very own annual book award for the best children’s fiction. Shortlisted titles will be announced in November and Year 7 pupils, from schools around the county, will pick the winner.