Scholastic Closing Literacy Place Textbooks Program

Posted on April 18, 2001

Scholastic Corporation announced that it has decided to close Scholastic Literacy Place, its basal textbook reading program. Scholastic will not provide for any future state adoptions and will instead focus its educational publishing efforts on reading improvement programs. Scholastic will continue to support Literacy Place customers with professional development, materials and service, and will utilize selected Literacy Place content in other programs.

The decision will result in the elimination of approximately l00 editorial and support positions (approximately 1% of the Company's workforce). Literacy Place is expected to account for approximately 2% of Scholastic's total revenue in the current fiscal year ending May 31, 2001. Scholastic will now focus its educational publishing efforts on its research-based reading improvement instructional materials consisting of intervention, technology, phonics, early childhood, extended learning and summer school programs.

``Literacy Place was published to critical acclaim,'' said Richard Robinson, Chairman, President and CEO, ``and has had sales of more than $250 million since its debut in 1995. While Literacy Place is an outstanding product, it has not met our long-term financial goals and would not have done so in an acceptable time frame. Basal textbook reading programs are expensive to develop and highly dependent on statewide adoptions and have become increasingly competitive.

Scholastic will continue to have an educational presence in schools with supplementary materials such as classroom magazines, paperback libraries, and professional books for teachers, Grolier nonfiction children's books for libraries, as well as core curriculum reading improvement products. Scholastic is a global children's publishing and media company serving the needs of parents, teachers, and children.