Iole Lucchese

Iole Lucchese was appointed Executive Vice President of Scholastic Corporation in 2016 and Chair of the Board of Directors in 2021, having served as Chief Strategy Officer since 2014. A 30-year veteran of the Company, she has consistently led innovative efforts to deepen connections with and better support teachers, families, young readers, and other consumers, while expanding access to Scholastic content around the world. During her career, she has worked to modernize Scholastic for the digital age, forge new and innovative partnerships, and extend the Company’s reach to diverse audiences, focusing on content development and the strengthening of the Scholastic brand in publishing and education.   

In her role as Chief Strategy Officer, this focus has enabled the Company to continue to advance its strategic and creative initiatives across all business units—including new offerings, business transformation and complementary cross-Company marketing. In addition to her corporate strategic role, Iole is also responsible for the company’s digital content and e-commerce strategy, including the use of social media and new ways of approaching parents directly.

Iole led the successful relaunch of Scholastic Entertainment in 2017 by recognizing the untapped potential of the Scholastic brand to bring its beloved stories and content to multiple platforms. Against the backdrop of an exploding streaming landscape, the division rapidly expanded under her leadership, growing to a highly-profitable business as Scholastic’s media activities met the market’s need for engaging children’s content. As a result, numerous projects are currently in development or production today, ranging from animated series like Peabody Award-winning and Daytime Emmy® Award-nominated Stillwater on AppleTV+ and Clifford the Big Red Dog on Amazon Prime Video and PBS Kids, to live action films like Clifford the Big Red Dog and The Magic School Bus Rides Again. With an eye toward strategic investment and a focus on discovering and celebrating diverse voices, Iole also spearheaded a partnership with the new media company Picturestart. The highly-anticipated screen adaptation of Animorphs is currently in development—a product of the companies’ partnership. Iole also sits on the Board of Picturestart.  

At Scholastic Canada, Iole led the publishing and marketing group, recognizing the opportunity to create a content pipeline among international offices, and ensuring shared access to the rich content that has made Scholastic so meaningful to educators, families, and kids. Ultimately, Scholastic Canada was cemented as the #1 children’s book publisher in that market and, during Iole’s tenure, revenues grew from $25 million to $150 million (Canadian) annually by the time she joined Scholastic’s headquarters office in New York City.

Iole began her career at Scholastic, after initially planning to follow her family into teaching. A native of Canada, her very first job was with Scholastic Canada Book Clubs. She began as an associate editor for the book clubs, quickly bringing a critical eye for enhancement that led to increasing the number of books, diversifying the offerings and strategically structuring pricing for better profitability, while still keeping books affordable and enabling access to children of all backgrounds.

Born in Toronto, Ontario, Ms. Lucchese is a first-generation college graduate, having received her degrees from the University of Toronto.