1、August 4,2023 Fellow Shareholders,Scholastic finished fiscal 2023 strongly,sustaining momentum from fiscal 2022 and showing the importance of the Companys focus on our customers,our mission and our future.Profitability rose on solid revenue growth,as we also continued investing in the foundations of
2、 Scholastics long-term growth.Successful performance management and the benefit of operational efficiencies achieved since the pandemic helped overcome the years short-term headwinds.Scholastic also demonstrated its commitment to enhance shareholder returns,returning$161 million to shareholders thro
3、ugh share repurchases and the regular dividend.For more than 100 years,Scholastic has been guided by the belief that all children deserve access to books and the power of reading.This mission is more relevant today than ever,as confirmed by nine-and 13-year-olds recent performance on the National As
4、sessment of Educational Progress.Already low before the pandemic,scores have fallen steeply since and are now at their lowest levels in decades.These results emphasize the critical need for childrens books and for solutions to help kids and young students learn and love to read a need that all paren
5、ts,teachers and leaders across our country can agree on.As we begin fiscal 2024,we are executing an integrated,four-part strategy to address this need and to drive growth and shareholder value for the long term,at the same time protecting margins and sustaining the growth we achieved in fiscal 2023:
6、First,we are building on the strengths and scale of our market-leading Childrens Book businesses to achieve sustainable,long-term revenue growth and increasing profitability.Scholastics content and direct access to customers provide a unique strategic position to further expand our share of the chil