School Visits

I don't know where you live, jmascia, bu in Australia the first thing I'd do, when the book is published, is submit it for consideration by the Premier's Reading Challenge of each State. To get on that list ensures libraries, school libraries and students themselves will buy the book. I've also sent an email to every school library to tell them about me and my fantastic book (lol).

I've also sent an email to all the highschools in the area I live in, but I find in Australia is is a hard market to get into. Public libraries are easy. School visits hard. Are you or have you been a teacher? That would help. I've only given talks at six high schools and they went over very well but the news of my (free) services hasn't spread from school to school. I think it is a tree-shaped communication design and doesn't work well even then. (also, my kids have left school so I don't even have an 'in' using them!)

But I hope your school system is better than ours, as far as author's visits go.

jmascia - I found that many authors interested in school visits have that information on their websites.

I plan to have my children's book out next year. I will be checking out the school websites, calling and mailing literature if need be. I will include in my website what services I will provide during the visit.

The websites below are only examples.

http://www.marcicurtis.com/schoolvisit2.html

http://www.suemacy.com/school_visit.html

http://www.bravemonster.com/visits.htm


It is also free to be listed as an author willing to do school visits using the below site.

http://authorbystate.blogspot.com/

Then there are these sites you could sign up with and have the schools contact you.

http://www.authorsillustrators.com/

http://130.94.182.22/index.html

http://visitingauthors.com/

This site gives some very useful information and does include information that can work for High School visits.

http://www.writing-world.com/children/school.shtml

In the UK, a bunch of new laws have just come in requiring various permits and proof your not a paedophile in exchange for money (not popular with authors right now). Despite that, a friend of mine has managed to pull in several school visit by simply starting with her own school - most schools love old students coming back to show how well they've done - and working out. Did any of your old teachers move to other schools? Would they remember you (or can they be guilted into pretending they do!)? Is your school part of a network or group? If you can get hold of the PTA, see if any of the parents have kids in other schools who they could recommend you to. Do you know anyone with kids whose schools you could visit?

CaoPaux said:

Start by calling your local district's office to ask what the process is. If you need to call individual schools, be sure to ask what other authors have visited recently, then check out those authors' blogs, etc. for more info on their visit. School sites sometimes have event reports, too.

Click to expand...

Superb advice, which is why I left it quoted in full.

I would suggest that you likewise look into speaking/selling at libraries. Some even will PAY you (so will schools, for that matter, if they have budgeted for author visits) to speak. Just be prepared with enough of value for the audience, wherever you speak.

--Ken

jmascia said:

ResearchGuy - What do you mean by "Just be prepared with enough of value for the audience, wherever you speak.". . . .

Click to expand...

Have a prepared presentation that is worth the time to listen to (without sounding overprepared). Just talking about your book might not be enough. Be entertaining and informative. I suspect that kids that age are a tough audience. Sorry I can't be more specific than that. If you can sit in on some talks by authors who have a track record of being invited again and again to talk to students, that might be helpful in learning the ropes.

My opinions FWIW.

--Ken