On Jan. 19 representatives from organizations that are part of the Center for the Book's reading promotion network met at the Library to exchange ideas about promoting "Books Change Lives," the theme for 1993-1994.
Center for the Book Director John Y. Cole reported that the number of partners increased by 13 during 1993 to reach an all- time high of 128. Each organizational partner participates in the program by developing its own projects that use the "Books Change Lives" theme or a variation; by publicizing the theme and its involvement with the Library of Congress in the effort; or by making a financial or in-kind contribution to the campaign.
The most recent additions to the partnership program are the American Association of Community Colleges, the Auxiliary of the National Rural Letter Carriers Association and the National Science Teachers Association. Other partners are major professional literacy and library organizations, labor unions, one regional and two national newspaper associations, one of the largest newspaper groups in North America, major service organizations (including Kiwanis, the Lions Clubs, and the General Federation of Women's Clubs) as well as those that speak for senior citizens, the scientific community, lawyers, and those engaged in the education of prison inmates.
Nine of the 128 partners are U.S. government agencies: the Departments of Agriculture (4H Youth Programs), Defense (Dependents' School System), Education, Energy, Health and Human Services (Administration for Children and Families), Justice (Federal Bureau of Prisons) and Labor; the U.S. Information Agency; and the U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science. Also participating are major African- American, Hispanic and Native American organizations, and associations grouping -- among others -- the governors and lieutenant governors of the 50 states, cartoonists, rural electric cooperatives and U.S. swimmers. A complete list of reading promotion partners is available from the Center for the Book, Library of Congress, Washington, DC 20540.
The purpose of the Jan. 19 meeting was described in remarks prepared for the occasion by the Center for the Book's Michael Thompson:
"The five of us at the Center for the Book find these annual get-togethers very useful -- as a way of assessing the effectiveness of our efforts to promote literacy and reading over the year just ended, as a way of stimulating thought and provoking suggestions about the year ahead and as a necessary lesson in humility. Thanks to all of you, we are forced to recognize that by no means all the good ideas on how to promote literacy and reading flow outward from the Center for the Book. As you will see this afternoon, you are the source of many of them."
Examples of projects developed by partners and Center for the Book sponsors include: the restocking of a flood-devastated library in Kansas by American Mensa Ltd., with all the books supplied carrying an American Mensa/"Books Change Lives" bookplate; a student essay contest in Dallas/Fort Worth sponsored by the North Texas Association of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, with a $1,000 scholarship as a prize, plus the gift of $500 worth of books to the winner's school library; a brochure containing a list of 30 children's books "that have the potential to change lives," selected by the Book Links advisory board of the American Library Association; the display of the "Books Change Lives" poster, along with presentations and the distribution of materials, by the National Council of Negro Women at all seven of its annual "Black Family Reunion Celebrations" in 1993 -- in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Los Angeles, Memphis, Chicago, and Washington, D.C.; an appeal in the International Reading Association's Reading Today newspaper for letters from individual readers about how books have changed their lives; the issuing by the U.S. Postal Service of a poster honoring four new 29-cent stamps featuring favorite childhood books and the "Books Change Lives" campaign; the distribution by the Thomson Newspapers Corp. of brochures on the theme "Newspapers Change Lives," along with the distribution of camera-ready copy of interviews with Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and Center for the Book director John Cole to its 240 newspapers in the United States and Canada; the sponsoring by the Pennsylvania Center for the Book, Borders Book Shop, and Pizza Hut of a "Books Change Lives" essay and poetry contest for 12th graders in Philadelphia, Lancaster, and Pittsburgh, Pa.; use by they New Jersey Connection of the "Books Change Lives" theme to draw attention to its four annual statewide literacy efforts -- the Enthusiastic Reader award, read-a-thons, a book of student's writings about reading and the Enthusiastic Teacher or Librarian award; the production by the Graphics Office of the American Library Association of a striking "Books Change Lives" commemorative poster by illustrators Leo and Diane Dillon, as well as bookmarks and T-shirts and sweatshirts featuring Thomas Jefferson's statement "I cannot live without books"; the dedication by the Modern Language Association of the program of its 1993 convention, held in Toronto on Dec. 27-30, "to the Library of Congress Center for the Book, whose 1993-94 theme is " 'Books Change Lives' " and the use by Baker & Taylor of the theme in its publications, the monthly Book Alert and its annual catalog, Books for Growing Minds.