Images from Derrick Barnes' website
Award-winning author Derrick Barnes and the cover for a book he co-wrote that was a finalist for the 2022 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.
An award-winning children’s book author has called off his speaking engagement at the Hoover Public Library next week after having three visits at Hoover schools canceled last week.
National Book Award finalist Derrick Barnes was scheduled to speak at Bluff Park, Deer Valley and Gwin elementary schools in Hoover as part of Black History Month in February, but all three appearances were canceled last week, with school officials citing the lack of a contract.
Barnes, who had been in communication with a Gwin Elementary School librarian since the spring of 2022, last week in an Instagram post said his appearances were canceled “out of the blue” and said that because of the “vague reason for canceling,” he believed the cancellations were political.
“This has got to stop. Children are being shortchanged, and the livelihood of children’s authors are being affected in a major way,” Barnes wrote. “God bless the educators and media specialists that do their best to bring us to their schools, only to have things stirred up and halted by a few parents or school board members who simply want their children to be held from the truth and kept uninformed. Pray for the babies, y'all.”
And today, Barnes posted on Facebook that his speaking engagements in two Birmingham suburbs “were canceled by a phantom parent who was concerned with my work supposedly fitting into the boogie man category of critical race theory.”
Barnes said Hoover schools Superintendent Dee Fowler is “denying the children in your district an opportunity to expand their minds and to be exposed to authors and books that will equip them to be in a very diverse world, and teach them empathy and understanding towards others. What good can come from keeping a generation of children in the dark as it relates [to] truth and tolerance?”
He thanked Hoover and Birmingham area parents, citizens, media specialists and educators from Hoover and Alabaster schools that he said reached out to him to show love and “apologize for the narrow-minded thinking of a small few.
“NOTHING will stop me from creating books that exhibit Black joy, and aim[ing] to teach inclusivity, defiance, excellence, the true, honest history of others, resistance and most importantly, love,” Barnes wrote.
Fowler today declined to answer questions directly, instead referring questions to the school district’s public relations specialist, Sherea Harris-Turner.
Harris-Turner said a parent expressed a concern about “inappropriate language” Barnes used in social media posts unrelated to his books, but Harris-Turner said that was not the reason Barnes’ visit was canceled.
Once the complaint came to the attention of the school district’s executive leadership team, that team realized Barnes didn’t have a contract to come speak at Hoover schools, Harris-Turner said.
School librarians were planning for their schools to pay Barnes $3,300 each, for a total of $9,900, but anytime the school district is paying a speaker, a contract is required, Harris-Turner said.
School officials asked Barnes’ representative for a contract three times and never received one, she said. On one of those occasions, Barnes’ representative replied that he doesn’t do contracts for speaking engagements that are less than $5,000, she said.
“The executive leadership team had to step in and say procedures weren’t followed, and that’s why unfortunately we had to dial back on it,” Harris-Turner said.
Book cover images from Derrick Barnes website
Three books by author Derrick Barnes: "I Am Every Good Thing," "Crown: An Ode to the Fresh Cut" and "The King of Kindergarten."
A written statement provided by Harris-Turner said “The Hoover City Schools District apologizes for the inconvenience caused to author Derrick Barnes and his team. … Due to the short notice of the cancellations, we have communicated with Mr. Barnes’ team, which has accepted our schools’ offer of reimbursing his travel costs and a portion of his engagement fee. We truly regret this unfortunate situation and show appreciation for his team’s understanding of the dynamics of this matter.”
Harris-Turner said the district is paying Barnes $3,800.
Barnes also was invited to speak at Meadow View Elementary School in Alabaster on Feb. 11, said Jason Gaston, a spokesman for Alabaster City Schools. However, after Hoover schools canceled his visits, Barnes asked to move his speaking engagement in Alabaster to Feb. 8, Gaston said. Initially, that date did not seem workable, but the Alabaster school district since has informed Barnes that he is welcome on Feb. 8, other days next week or later in the school year, Gaston said.
Meanwhile, the Hoover Public Library today issued a statement that Barnes informed the library he would be unable to travel to Alabama to attend his scheduled “Pizza with the Author” event on Feb. 7. The library will, however, be celebrating Barnes’ books with activities and crafts that evening at 5 p.m., the statement said. The library is working with Barnes to reschedule his visit for later this year.
Efforts to reach Barnes or his booking agent for comment about whether he will come to Alabaster next week or another time — or other comments about the Hoover visits — have been unsuccessful.
Barnes today found out one of his books, “Victory. Stand! Raising My Fist For Justice,” received three Youth Media Awards from the American Library Association: the Young Adult Library Services Association Award for Excellence in Nonfiction, the Coretta Scott King Author Honor and Coretta Scott King Illustration Honor. That book also was a finalist for the 2022 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature.
Barnes was a co-writer for the book, along with Tommie Smith, the gold medal winner of the 200-meter race in the 1968 Olympics who was one of two medalists who famously stood on the medal podium in black socks and raised black-gloved fists to protest racial injustice inflicted upon African Americans.
Barnes also wrote “Crown: An Ode to the Fresh Cut,” which received a Newbery Honor, a Coretta Scott King Author Honor, the Ezra Jack Keats New Writer Award and the Kirkus Prize for Young Readers. Other books he wrote that were New York Times bestsellers were “I Am Every Good Thing,” “The King of Kindergarten” and “The Queen of Kindergarten.”
“There was nothing about his books that would have kept him from coming to our schools to speak,” Harris-Turner said. “It was just about business procedures. I hate that it’s turned into this big race thing. It’s just sad.”
