More Than 27 Million Children Have Read for Kids in Need Through ClassroomsCare
NEW YORK, N.Y. (May 20, 2009) – More than 27 million kids have shown they care – just by reading a book.
This is the number of children who have read for a program called ClassroomsCare, created by Scholastic Book Clubs in 2001 to help teach kids about the importance of reading and empower them to give back to their communities. Scholastic Book Clubs is a division of Scholastic (NASDAQ: SCHL), the global children’s publishing, education and media company.
More than 1 million classrooms have participated in ClassroomsCare since its founding, helping Scholastic Book Clubs to donate more than 9 million books to kids in need. This Fall, football stars Eli and Peyton Manning will serve as the first-ever ClassroomsCare Ambassadors of Reading.
“ClassroomsCare is near and dear to my heart not only because of the number of books we are able to put in the hands of kids who desperately need them, but also because of the millions of children who learn a valuable lesson in giving through the program,” said Judy Newman, President of Scholastic Book Clubs. “It’s thrilling to see this program impacting so many children.”
ClassroomsCare is an annual challenge to classrooms that use Scholastic Book Clubs. Participating classrooms read 100 books, triggering a donation of an aggregate total of 1 million books to ClassroomsCare charity partners. Classrooms keep track of the books they’ve read on posters and online, and then tell Scholastic when they’ve finished. Any books kids read in the classroom, with their parents or on their own count toward their goal. Teachers also download lesson plans and activity ideas from the Web to help frame a character education curriculum around ClassroomsCare.
“[ClassroomsCare] gives children here the chance to not only get literacy skills but to learn to share,” one teacher, Marie Farmer from Farmer Family Preschool, was quoted as saying in a recent news article. “Five little children are impacting 100 children way across America on the other shore.”
ClassroomsCare by the numbers:
- Total kids who have read for ClassroomsCare since 2001: 27,114,500*.
- Total books donated to charities through ClassroomsCare: 9 million.
- Total number of classrooms that have participated in ClassroomsCare: 1,084,580.
- Total number of books read because of ClassroomsCare: 117,458,000.
About Scholastic Book Clubs:
For 60 years, Scholastic Book Clubs has provided monthly catalogues offering top quality books and reading materials from all publishers to teachers and students in pre-school through high school. Seven different Scholastic Book Clubs reach over one million teachers each month, providing the most sought-after titles at affordable prices for children in classrooms nationwide. Over 80% of all elementary school teachers in the United States participate in Scholastic Book Clubs. Today, more than half of the orders from parents and teachers are received online through Scholastic Book Clubs’ new online ordering system.
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CONTACT: Tyler Reed, Scholastic, 212-343-6427 or treed@scholastic.com