One of the most beautiful things about a curriculum change is not just that it aligns learning with the emerging realities of a new world. A curriculum change is also an opportunity for publishers to reposition themselves in the market by tapping into the school curriculum market.
For publishers, especially in East Africa, governments remain the single biggest customer, whether directly or indirectly. I know big publishers that have made major turnarounds – or burned their fingers – courtesy of curriculum changes.
Besides earning profits for publishers whose books are selected as curriculum support materials or set books, a curriculum review sees new authors emerging, as editors commission scripts for submission and review as possible textbooks or set books. Needless to say, those whose books end up being bought and distributed to schools by the government end up smiling all the way to the bank.
Indeed, the industry has seen a steady influx of new entrants, with these being mainly authors whose works have in the past been selected as set books. Armed with fresh capital, and perhaps unhappy with their earlier publishers mainly over perceived poor sales of their books and low or unpaid royalties, some of these lucky authors often decide to go solo for a bite of the school materials procurement largesse. There have also been totally new entrants, either local or foreign investors, also angling for the school market cash cow.
Any keen observer of goings-on on the literary scene must have noticed that, over the past few weeks, there have been many calls for new authors to submit scripts to various new publishers. A keen look at the kind of scripts sought by these new publishers reveals that they appear closely aligned with what the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD), the technical arm of the Ministry of Education, has already called for submission or is likely to call for submission as it prepares to review the next instalment of textbooks and other support materials needed in the ongoing rollout of the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC).
To be sure, all these efforts and the opportunities they offer deserve celebration. We are talking about new authors, new publishers, new jobs for editors, designers, proofreaders, quality checkers, a mini boom in the logistics arm of the business as scripts are moved here and there, and other career leaps.
However, beneath this optimism and the high expectations in the industry is a small voice that calls for caution. First off, it goes without saying that as more players bid for slots in the school procurement market, even more publishers may end up with no selected books at all.
This means whatever they take months to prepare, and given that some are focusing more on high expectations and therefore end up developing more scripts than they can produce at a high quality, may end up being rejected. They may therefore end up putting all their money in one basket and lose it all if their works are not selected.
This is especially so for new entrants, who are promising new writers high royalty rates or offering to buy outright the rights to books that fit the set book criterion. These authors may also end up a disappointed lot if the publisher burns through its initial capital with an overambitious start.
One may be tempted to think that the established publishers are sitting pretty since some of their books have been procured in the past and they have many titles already selling in the market. The truth on the ground, as they say on the Kenyan streets, is starkly different.
The truth of the matter is that preparing for submissions is an expensive affair. Publishers have to hire extra editorial help, pay submission fees and almost literally put many other projects on hold to get the scripts right. Printing the dummies for submission also costs an arm and a leg. So do workshop costs, logistics and other related expenses.
This means that if you spend money raked in from other books to finance scripts to be evaluated by KICD panels of experts, you may find yourself under pressure to meet royalty obligations the following year if none of your scripts is approved and therefore procured for use in schools.
Now, it is painful for an author to receive a royalty statement showing the number of copies their books sold the previous year and the royalties earned, followed by a pained explanation that the publisher is unable to pay even the modest royalty earnings indicated in the statement.
I know it is not easy, but the really strategic publishers keep an eye on the open market books even as they participate in the school market rush. Make no mistake, though. I am not in any way discouraging publishers from helping in the rollout of the CBC. Far from it. Indeed, it is a labour of patriotism for a Kenyan or East African firm to be involved in shaping the curriculum and expanding the minds of the next generation of citizens.
What I am merely saying is that, as the competition for the CBC support materials market intensifies, it would be wise to identify an optimum number of slots that a publisher can target without burning their fingers.
If a few coins remain in the till, they can spread their bets by publishing the next promising script for a novel, play or anthology of short stories that targets not schools but the avid Kenyan reader who has for long been gasping to read a truly modern work of fiction they can relate to.
For, if you have noticed, many novels and anthologies from mainstream publishers in East Africa are written in standard English, follow the traditional narrative arc of the European canon, and remind you of a time past. The really experimental works are either self-published or published in the emerging literary journals.
Perhaps, as they angle for the school market, they could also bet on a truly postmodern title or two. Or perhaps new publishers could break from the mould and prove that someone can actually publish for the open market and use modern tools to market the work so aggressively that sales are good and authors get something to smile about at the end of the day.
If that happened, the winners would not just be publishers and authors. Readers would once again have a wider choice of contemporary East African stories that reflect the language, aspirations and anxieties of our own times.
In the long run, a healthy publishing industry is one that serves both the classroom and the bookshop, both the examination candidate and the leisure reader. The curriculum market may provide the capital, but it is often the open market that gives a nation's literature its soul.
