Criteria

Forty-seven states have a "readers' choice award" program of some kind. Eleven states have more than one program. We need to decide what we want OUR program to be.

 * Do we want to reach all grades with one program?
 * Should we have separate programs for different grade levels?
 * Do we want to include all genres (including non-fiction)?
 * How will we select titles for the readers to list?
 * will adults make all the decisions?
 * will we take suggestions from children? (one state takes suggestions from everyone and anyone, then randomly draws 8-10 titles from the suggestions.)
 * publication dates?
 * include titles from the Battle of the Books list?
 * ensure at least one Alaska author or title on the list?
 * will the titles be "exemplary" literature or books that will get reluctant readers reading?

Here are two links I found so you can explore what other states are doing:
http://www.carr.org/read/stateAwardbks.htm

http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/awards.htm#R