Schneider Family Book Award Books

The Schneider Family Book Award was endowed in 2003 by Dr. Katherine Schneider and her family. Schneider, blind since her premature birth in 1949, worked as a clinical psychologist for thirty years and credited a librarian at the Michigan Library for the Blind — who kept braille and recorded books arriving through her childhood — with much of that. It has been given annually since 2004 by the American Library Association to an author or illustrator whose book embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.

What distinguishes it is the standard for portrayal: disability appears as an integral part of a character's full life rather than as a source of pity or uplift, and the book may center a character's own disability or that of a friend or family member. Three winners are named each year, in separate bands for ages 4–8, 9–13, and 14–18, so the list stays usable from picture books through high school. It is a practical place to look for a story where a disabled child is the protagonist rather than the lesson.

Information from the American Library Association.