I don't think it was on our required reading list, no, but I read it. Basically I read my textbook as soon as I got it and then did whatever the fuck I wanted for the rest of the year, including reading other stuff. Matter of fact, I was loaning my teachers books, and some I never got back
I think it's highly, HIGHLY unlikely that a hollywood screenwriter would be ignorant of the hunger games base story. It goes all the way back to the fucking Minotaur and it probably existed even before that.