The CMC Reveals 2022 Creative Keynote Speaker

Award-winning performance poet, playwright and children’s author Joseph Coelho is set to deliver the creative keynote at The Children’s Media Conference (CMC), running from July 5 to 7.

Coelho, known for the Luna Loves picture books, middle-grade series Fairy Tales Gone Bad and the YA novel The Girl Who Became a Tree, was recently crowned the Waterstones Children’s Laureate 2022–24. His CMC keynote, celebrating kids’ culture and inspiring a love of reading, will take place on July 6 in the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.

Greg Childs OBE, editorial director at CMC, said, “We are so thrilled to be staging the first public appearance by the new Waterstones Children’s Laureate. We have had wonderful experiences with Children’s Laureates in the past—Malorie Blackman, Michael Rosen, Chris Riddell and Cressida Cowell—and they have remained good friends to CMC and all it stands for. I know that Joseph will carry on that tradition of brilliant analysis of his personal creative journey and passionate advocacy for his campaign goals and for children and young people in general. We always have fun with our creative keynotes, and we’re expecting that from the start, not least because in true CMC mix-it-up fashion the Laureate will be introduced this year by our changemakers Ollie Ball and Jacob Pasquill, teen TikTok comics with a massive social media following.”

Coelho joins CMC’s packed lineup, which includes a variety of master classes and panels tackling the issues facing the children’s media industry today. Agenda highlights include an opening keynote from YouTube’s Ben McOwen, managing director for the U.K.; the on-demand video interview “The Key To… Operation Ouch!”, in celebration of the show’s 10th anniversary; and “The Last Word” closing session from MC Grammar.