Banned Books Week runs October 1–7 this year. Although seven days won’t be enough to address the U.S. crisis over the right to read, BBW offers the chance to catch up on the issues and the grassroots actions under way in support of reading and writing.

Advocacy organizations have declared Saturday, October 7, a day to write a letter to an elected official, post about the freedom to read on social media, or put a local school board meeting on the calendar. American Library Association members call October 7 Freedom to Read Day, while PEN America followers refer to it as Banned Books Week Day of Action. Whatever the appellation, it’s an opportune time to champion the right to read.

There’s swag, too. MoveOn.org, which is among the several organizations sending a book bus around the country, unveiled a T-shirt with Banned Books Week honorary chair LeVar Burton, producer of the 2023 documentary The Right to Read. On social media, literary all-stars modeled the shirt, which features a Roy G. Biv color scheme.

We’ve gathered a number of efforts taking place throughout the week. For more virtual events and in–person opportunities, check out the many organizations that represent the Banned Books Week Coalition.

The American Library Association offers free virtual BBW programming through its Office for Intellectual Freedom. On October 4, at 1 p.m. ET, authors John Green (Looking for Alaska; The Fault in Our Stars) and Mike Curato (Flamer) appear with Texas FReadom Fighters co-founder Becky Calzada and Banned Books Week youth honorary chair Da’Taeveyon Daniels. That evening, at 8 p.m. ET, youth activist Daniels will interview LeVar Burton, via Instagram Live (@banned_books_week).

On October 5 at 2 p.m. ET, ALA executive director Tracie Hall will speak with Chris Jackson, publisher and editor-in-chief of PRH’s One World imprint, bringing audience members a virtual Rally for the Right to Read. Webinar hosts will screen a video of How to Be an Antiracist author Ibram X. Kendi’s speech at the 2023 ALA Annual Conference, and representatives from ALA’s Unite Against Book Bans will share resources. Ten attendees will win a full set of Kendi’s books. That evening, BBW youth chair Daniels will lead a roundtable with other student activists from South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas, on Instagram Live (@banned_books_week).

The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators is teaming up with the American Library Association at 7 p.m. ET on Thursday, October 5, for a virtual workshop called “Free People Read Freely: How Children’s Book Creatives Can Fight Book Banning.” Joyce McIntosh, assistant program director for the Freedom to Read Foundation, will address First Amendment education, litigation, and advocacy, and how SCBWI members can stand against book challenges. SCBWI has more than 21,000 members, according to SCBWI executive director Sarah Baker.

The American Booksellers Association and American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression provide resources in support of the freedom to read, plus talking points and q&as with booksellers, in the ABA Right to Read Toolkit. This year, “our main online event is our Banned Books Week 2023 Instagram Display Contest, in which we are asking member stores to tag pictures of their Banned Books Week displays for a chance to win a scholarship to Children’s Institute 2024,” said ABA advocacy associate manager Philomena Polefrone. Submissions to the Instagram contest are due by midnight on October 7.

The National Coalition Against Censorship and Kids Right to Read Network agitate year-round for the right to read. NCAC’s Christine Emeran, Youth Free Expression program director, encourages podcast listeners to download the Brooklyn Public Library podcast Borrowed and Banned, which recently hosted KRRN student activists.

PEN America shares “Banned in the U.S.A.” resources and statistics, and reports on censorship in classrooms. Visitors to PEN’s site can sign an “I Stand with the Banned” petition in conjunction with a federal lawsuit that PEN, PRH, and several authors are filing to challenge removals and restrictions on books in Escambia County, Fla.

PEN lists 19 panels—virtual and in–person—throughout October and well beyond BBW. Online participants can tune in for a conversation between PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel and playwright Richard Dresser on October 4, 7 p.m. ET, and a “From Howl to Now” virtual event through City Lights Booksellers in San Francisco on October 3, at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT, featuring author Nic Stone, the Texas FReadom Fighters’ Becky Calzada, PEN America chief program officer for free expression Summer Lopez, and PEN student activist Leela Hensler. Additional in-person events are happening at PEN chapters nationwide.

PEN is working with the ALA’s Unite Against Book Bans and with the Writers Guild to motivate writers and readers to write a letter to an elected official, leave a message at a state or local office, or post to social media about the right to read.

The Children’s Book Council is a member of the Banned Books Week Coalition. CBC executive director Carl Lennertz said the CBC, in partnership with Sourcebooks, mailed 2,000 CBC Free Speech Kits to librarians, teachers, and booksellers in August and September. Sticker templates, #freadom pages, and additional resources can be found on the CBC’s website, and the organization will host a “Keep Bans Off Our Books” panel at New York Comic Con on Thursday, October 12.

The CBC is also planning a Banned Books Week discussion for its membership at 12:30 p.m. ET on Thursday, October 5. Free speech advocate Pat Scales, author of Banned Books for Kids, will moderate a discussion with Raj Haldar, author of This Book Is Banned; Jonathan Haupt, executive director of the Pat Conroy Literary Center in Beaufort, S.C.; and student leader Millie Bennett of the Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization at Beaufort High School. When the Beaufort County Library pulled 97 books following a complaint of “inappropriate content,” DAYLO successfully rallied to get more than half of the books restored to the stacks.

The New York Public Library and the Atlantic are livestreaming a conversation between playwright and novelist Ayad Akhtar (Homeland Elegies), scholar and columnist Imani Perry (South to America), and Atlantic executive editor Adrienne LaFrance, to be held on October 5 at 7 p.m. ET. The panel will discuss the danger that book banning poses to democracy as well as ways to counteract attempts to silence authors and artists.