School Reading Champions is for primary and secondary schools and offers support in involving boys in the development of the school's reading culture. It does this by maximising the motivational power of male reading role models (boys and male members of staff) to encourage other boys to take up the reading habit.

Schools are also encouraged to think about providing support for girls alongside the Reading Champions scheme. As such we have created Reading Angels, which runs easily alongside Reading Champions. Currently national recognition is reserved for the boys, however we are in the process of developing the project. It will become a fully-fledged equivalent for the girls in September 2008.

How school Reading Champions works
Support for Reading Champion schools
Getting your school's dads involved

Number of Reading Champion schools by region and local authority:
View primary school graphs
View secondary school graphs

How school Reading Champions works

"Every school deserves to have Reading Champions, opening up the world of reading. We need to put the magic of reading right into the heart of childhood - and Reading Champions can be the engine that turns schools into story reading centres." Pie Corbett, Literacy Consultant

School Reading Champions offers a flexible and motivational framework designed to engage boys and men in developing a reading culture. This framework, drawing on lessons learnt from successful boys' reading schemes, contains these key ingredients:

The framework offers increasingly pro-active ideas. It has three levels of achievement that the boys can work towards. Once they have completed appropriate activities, boys can then be nominated online and will receive Reading Champions certificates and badges.

Level	Description	Example
Bronze Reading Champions	stand up and declare their enthusiasm for reading	writing outstanding book reviews or recommendations
Silver Reading Champions	are involved in schemes to encourage other boys to read	helping to organise a recommended reads display
Gold Reading Champions	make an outstanding contribution to the school reading culture	instigating a reading based event

Each Reading Champion school is also encouraged to nominate a Reading Champion coach. This can be a teacher, librarian or any adult (male or female) connected to the school who has a genuine passion for getting everyone reading.

There is scope to involve dads and other adult males as Reading Champions to further inspire the boys. Schools have successfully engaged male members of staff, local community professionals and role models, authors and family members.

School Reading Champions was developed with the help of literacy consultant Pie Corbett and seven pilot schools in 2004. It was offered nationally from 2005.

School Reading Champions gain access to:

• A welcome pack by email and a toolkit by post
• Practical tried-and-tested ideas online
• Certificates for nominated Reading Champions and use of the logo
• A national network of schools all looking to share ideas and expertise
• Downloadable posters and resources
• Inspiring case studies
• A blog for your school

School Reading Champion blogs

Schools can create a blog (or web log) to showcase the work they are doing. To get started, find your school's record by region and local authority on our Reading Champions network maps. You can also read other schools' blogs to find out what they are doing.

Schools can also use their blog to promote future events. Tell the Reading Champions team about an event and we may be able to get local press invovled, so that your Reading Champions promotion is given the attention it deserves. To submit a future event, find your school's record by region and local authority on our Reading Champions network maps.