Industry Panel: The AI Debate — Kait Feldmann

Kait Feldmann is a children’s book agent at kt literary representing illustrators. She previously worked as an editor at HarperCollins and Scholastic. Kait is passionate about championing books by, about, and for BIPOC. In 2020 she received the CBC Diversity Outstanding Achievement Award. 

Moderator Martha Brockenbrough asks the panel if they are receiving AI generated submissions and if so, how are those handled?

KAIT: Most agencies and editors are now including official stances and clauses about not using AI.

Kait has started seeing more submissions with AI, and while some state their AI usage outright, Kait can still recognize AI-generated ones—most obviously from writers who think they need to include art to submit a picturebook manuscript. Kait reiterates that is NOT part of the submitting author's job. It's happened enough that Kait now has a form rejection for these AI submissions. While Kait is all for technology taking over dishes, laundry, and taxes she still prefers humans writing and making art.

KAIT: I don't want AI to touch any part of your creative process. 

The panel talks about how any content inputted into an AI tool like Claude or ChatGPT is no longer work under your copyright and is also used as training material by that LLM. Kait reminds us AI is technically a plagiarizing tool that has been scraping from published creators who have not been paid, credited, or given consent. 

She encourages people who want to use AI to write or illustrate to ask themselves why they don't feel like they are capable of creating it themselves? Kait says it's okay to not know answers and struggle with your creating, the real writing is in the revising. 

Kait adds there is an additional moral dilemma to using AI: The huge environmental strain of using LLMs like ChatGPT and Claude which run on the loud, water-guzzling data centers that are being built without appropriate environmental regulations (if any) overwhelmingly in poorer regions of countries where its residents have no political standing or funding to push back or stop the construction or pollution. Kait likens it to shopping on Amazon or Shein, it's up to you how comfortable you are contributing to known causes of the global climate crisis.

Industry Panel: The AI Debate - Ginee Seo

 

Ginee Seo is VP and Editorial Director of Ten Speed Young Readers, the children's book imprint at Ten Speed/Crown. She has worked in children's book publishing for over 35 years and has held a number of positions, including Executive Publishing Director of Children’s Books at Chronicle Books; VP, Associate Publisher at Atheneum Books for Young Readers, where she also had her own eponymous imprint; and VP, Editorial Director at Harper Trophy. 

A note on this conversation, as AI is quite broad. In this conversation, the panelist are speaking to generative AI technology. Keeping in mind that generative AI has been built on copyrighted material (without compensation for that work). 

Martha asks about AI clauses in contracts.

Ginee shares that PRH doesn’t have a specific AI clause as of now, but they do already have a a clause that expresses that the work is solely created by the author. That said, they (PRH) very much believe in protecting copyright. On the copyright page of each book, there is a statement that any use of generative AI using the book is not allowed (protecting the person/people behind the book). 

She also shares that at Ten Speed, they have core principles:

• Human authorship is essential

• Originality and IP integrity is nonnegotiable

• Transparency and early communication are key

She says it all comes down to protecting you. 

Ginee wanted to be on this panel to share this message: Protect your text. Do not run your text through AI. If you do, you are giving away your material. People are not aware how invasive and intrusive AI is. 

Ginee is not seeing any request from agents or authors to not put their work through AI, but she thinks that’s likely to change

She is asked if any publishers are taking their IP work and putting it into AI to generate more work like it. Ginee hopes not, but she could see a possibility of that happening. 

On the question of using AI to research, Ginee says to consider the information are you giving it. Know it can be wrong. That it is only just a starting place.

Final advice: Ginee fears that maybe the conversation has created a bit of fear. She just wants you all, as book creators, to know: Do not make it easy for these companies to take your IP. Don't take the shortcuts. And, if you were to write something to share with publishing gatekeepers you might say, "All work done by an imperfect human." Imperfection is what makes us beautiful. It's what makes art. 

What an informative conversation about this important topic. If you want to listen, you can still register for the conference at scbwi.org and watch the replay. 

Opening Keynote: Pam Muñoz Ryan

 

Pam Muñoz Ryan has written over forty books for young people that include picture books for the very young, picture books for older readers, and the middle grade and young adult novels, Mañanaland, RIDING FREEDOM, ESPERANZA RISING, BECOMING NAOMI LEÓN, PAINT THE WIND, THE DREAMER, and the Newbery Honor book, ECHO (Feb. 2015.) 

Pam earned masters degree with the plan to teach child literature at a college. But didn’t end up doing that, instead she started writing for kids. Her first books were picture books. 

RIDING FREEDOM, her first novel, started as a picture book and her editor encouraged her to instead write it as a novel. (This is not uncommon that writers start a story as a picture book but there’s more story there to tell.)

A treat: Pam gives a peek into her working world. So much fun to see her office (all tidied up for the photo). To see her bulletin board and calendar. She also gives us a peek into some of her pages, with editorial notes handwrittn on the pages. Pam shares that her editor is often asking many questions of her and her story.

Pam will share her confessions (truths about Pam and her writing, which might not be true about you). Here is a sampling?

• As a kid, Pam didn’t know being a writer was a job you could have. She thought writers were dead.
• She was a late bloomer in the writing world.
• As a child, Pam never questioned why she didn’t see herself in books, for many reasons, including the time in which she grew (there were few choices and she didn’t know otherwise)
• Pam does wonder what it would have been like if she would have read even one book where she could see herself in its pages
• Pam has been able to live vicariously through readers who have found themselves her in her books
• Pam wishes writers would ask less about how to get published (the successes) and instead about the failures. A few things she'd share about: Setting aside a manuscript that I had over-shopped; Getting published and discovering I could still fail. Rewriting. And rewriting. And rewriting. 
• Pam shares this profession is often frustrating and test your patience. "If you’re not trying and failing, you are going nowhere."
• Pam doesn’t track drafts, or her daily word count. She can’t separate the writing from the rewriting. It’s all rewriting. Reading and rewriting and inching the story forward. “For me writing is all revision.” She says it's a very messy evolution. 
• When it comes to writers block, Pam doesn’t have time. This is a job. She says, “I go to work, whether I want to or not.”
• Pam doesn’t have a muse! 
• If there’s one thing Pam wants us all to know: Momentum is far more important than inspiration. 

Welcome Summer 2026 with Sarah Baker

Sarah Baker, Executive Director of SCBWI, leads our virtual conference welcome this morning. Sarah began her career in children’s book publishing at Penguin Young Readers Group as a designer. Her debut illustrated picture book, Becca & Bubbe's Bucket List, written by Laura Gehl came out this May.

Sarah reminds us this conference is for anyone and everyone interesting in making books for kids and young adults, and this year's virtual format again lets even more people tune in from all over the world. Based on live polling, the makeup of attendees is over 60% pre-published, and over 60% writers.

Sarah gives a shout out to this year's conference materials illustrator, Heegyum Kim.

And invites us to remember two great names in children's literature we lost this year, Mildred Pitts Walter and Jane Yolen.

If you want to follow along with the rest of the conference, register at https://www.scbwi.org/events/virtual-summer-conference-2026. Replays of the conferences will be available after the conference for a limited time.

Conference art by Heegyum Kim

Team Blog is Ready to GO!

Elated, Hydrated, and Motivated! 

Team Blog is back for another round of the SCBWI Conferences! This summer, Jaime Temairik and Jolie Stekly will be returning to live blog this international conference. Countless people will be logging on and locking in for an exciting weekend of panels, discussion, breakout sessions, virtual social hours, and more! And Team Blog will be capturing highlights throughout the whole weekend. 

Follow along with us here on The Official SCBWI Conference Blog and check out all there is to offer at SCBWI! Don't forget to tag SCBWI with the hashtag #scbwiSummer26!