• Gateway

    2021-2022 Gateway Award Nominees

    Field
    The Field Guide to the North American Teenager
    By Ben Philippe
    This humorous, insightful story follows a black French Canadian teenager grappling with his parents' divorce and the upheaval that comes with moving from Canada to Texas in the middle of the school year.
    SLAY 
    Slay
    By Brittany Morris
    By day, seventeen-year-old Kiera is an honors student, math tutor, and one of the only Black kids at Jefferson Academy. But at home, she joins hundreds of thousands of Black gamers who duel worldwide as Nubian personas in the secret multiplayer online role-playing card game, SLAY. 
    With the
    With the Fire on High
    By Elizabeth Acevedo
    Emoni has a baby at the end of her freshman year of high school and makes some life-changing choices. Her strong support system, which not every teen mother has, gives Emoni an excellent chance at keeping both her and her daughter's lives on a positive track.
    Escape
    The Escape of Light
    By Fred Venturini
    Wilder Tate is a self-proclaimed basketball junkie from small-town Illinois who is haunted by a childhood incident resulting in burn scars on much of his upper body and face.
    I know
    I Know You Remember
    By Jennifer Donaldson
    After three long years away, Ruthie  arrives in her hometown of Anchorage, Alaska to the devastating news that Zahra, Ruthie's best friend, is missing. Ruthie vows to do whatever it takes to find her.
    Field
    Field Notes on Love
    By Jennifer E. Smith
    Just dumped by his girlfriend, Hugo is determined to take his planned train trip across the US. One snag: the companion ticket is already booked under the name of his ex, Margaret Campbell. Nontransferable. Enter the new Margaret C. After finding Hugo's spare ticket offer online, she's convinced it's the perfect opportunity to expand her horizons.
    Lovely
    The Lovely and the Lost
    By Jennifer Lynn Barnes
    After living alone and abandoned in the wild, a teenage girl leads her adoptive family's search-and-rescue operation -- but to find a missing child, she must uncover long-buried secrets from her past.
    Grace
    The Grace Year
    By Kim Liggett
    A rebellious 16-year-old is sent to an isolated island for her grace year, when she must release her seductive, poisonous magic into the wild before taking her proper place as a wife and child bearer. In gaslit Garner County, women and girls are said to harbor diabolical magic capable of manipulating men.
    Heroine
    Heroine
    By Mindy McGinnis
    When a car crash sidelines Mickey just before softball season, she has to find a way to hold on to her spot as the catcher for a team expected to make a historic tournament run. Edgar Award-winning author Mindy McGinnis delivers a necessary novel about addiction, family, friendship, and hope. 
    Where
    Where I End and You Begin
    By Preston Norton
    Ezra Slevin and Wynonna Jones are sworn enemies—until they start swapping bodies and realize that they have more in common than they thought.
    Ordinary
    Ordinary Hazards
    By Nikki Grimes
    After being abused by a babysitter when she was 3, Grimes and her beloved older sister, Carol, enter another set of revolving doors: foster care, sometimes loving, sometimes not. ... Grimes recounts her story as a memoir in verse, writing with a poet's lyricism through the lens of memory fractured by trauma.
    Patron
    Patron Saints of Nothing
    By Randy Ribay
    A coming-of-age story about grief, guilt, and the risks a Filipino-American teenager takes to uncover the truth about his cousin's murder. Jay plans to spend the last semester of his senior year playing video games before heading to college in the fall. But when he discovers that his Filipino cousin Jun was murdered as part of President Duterte's war on drugs, and no one in the family wants to talk about what happened, Jay travels to the Philippines to find out the real story.
    Fire
    Fireborne
    By Rosaria Munda
    Annie and Lee were just children when a brutal revolution changed their world, giving everyone--even the lowborn--a chance to test into the governing class of dragonriders. Now they are both rising stars in the new regime, despite backgrounds that couldn't be more different.
    Intern
    Internment
    By Samira Ahmed
    Set in a horrifying near-future United States, seventeen-year-old Layla Amin and her parents are forced into an internment camp for Muslim American citizens.
     
    Gateway Award Winners 2020-2021
    • 1st Place – The Unfortunates 
    • 2nd Place – The Cruel Prince
    • 3rd Place – Dry  

  • Project LIT

    What is #ProjectLITBookClub?

    Project LIT Community is a national, grassroots literacy movement, a team of dedicated educators and students who work together to:
    • EMPOWER our students as readers, writers, and leaders
    • PROMOTE a love of reading in our schools and communities
    • NURTURE authentic reading identities by increasing access to high-quality books, building community, and fostering a sense of belonging
    • CHAMPION young people and books that reflect their lived realities, communities, and identities
    • ADVOCATE for literacy policies and practices that will build lifelong readers
    • SUPPORT AND INSPIRE one another as we improve our practice and pedagogy
    • READ, DISCUSS, AND CELEBRATE books that make our students feel seen, heard, affirmed, and valued
    • DEVELOP our cultural competence and EXPAND our thinking, regardless of individual starting point
    • AMPLIFY voices and stories of students and educators of color
    • REWRITE the narrative about which texts and authors are deemed worthy of academic study
    • PROVIDE students with as many positive literacy experiences as possible

    Link to ALL PROJECT LIT SELECTIONS (as of Dec. 2020)