Literacy news

National Young Readers' Programme is the new name for RIF UK

2 Mar 2010

Reading Is Fundamental, UK (RIF) was established as an initiative of the National Literacy Trust in 1996, based on the model of Reading Is Fundamental, Inc, active in the US since 1966.

RIF was initially funded as a three-year pilot thanks to a grant from Tate and Lyle. The earliest project involved just 12 Primary Schools, but within five years the scheme was reaching 15,000 - 20,000 children at up to 300 sites every year. To date, more than 935,000 books have been chosen by over 315,000 children.

Now in its 15^th year, RIF has undergone some significant changes since its inception. Thanks to two years of quite intensive research and our project coordinators’ feedback, we have a better understanding of the impact RIF can make on disadvantaged children, young people and families, and on the settings that our projects are delivered in.

Unsurprisingly, RIF in the UK is now a very different project from the original RIF US model. We believe that now is the time to change our name.

Through consultation with staff at the National Literacy Trust, local practitioners who deliver RIF, other professionals in the NLT network, and the Board of Trustees of the National Literacy Trust, we’ve decided on:

National Young Readers’ Programme

We think that this name helps to bring attention to our programme’s main aim: to create readers. The National Young Readers’ Programme is a name that highlights what our coordinators and projects are doing to help children and young people to become readers by seeing the value of reading for pleasure. While we are a programme that helps to inspire children and young people to become readers through books, our programme is about so much more than the free books.

Tags: National Young Readers' Programme

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