Publicize Your Events

Sample Press Release

Teen Read Week Encourages Teens to Get Graphic @ Your Library™

What are graphic novels? Why encourage kids to read them? The answers to these questions will be revealed during Teen Read Week, which will be celebrated at (name of library or school or bookstore) October 13–19, along with hundreds of other libraries or schools or bookstores to encourage teens to “read for the fun of it.”

Do kids read comics? Do teens read? Yes, they do. If not, these Teen Read events will help teens develop a habit of reading for the fun of it @ your library™. Reading for the fun of it is the very best way to acquire a reading habit, a very valuable acquisition for teens. Why? Because the news about reading proficiency and reading in our society is not good. The Nation’s Report Card (http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard) reports that reading scores have made no significant statistical gains since the 1970s. And that is not all. A smaller percentage of thirteen- and seventeen-year-olds read for fun daily in 1999 than in 1971. A reading habit will increase reading proficiency. The report card also finds that in homes across America, the number of different types of reading materials have decreased, and a smaller percentage of seventeen-year-olds saw adults reading in their homes in the same period. Clearly, adults must also acquire a reading habit if they are to serve as models for children and young adults.

Programs and events include:

[list your programs and events here]

[Name of spokesperson] says there are lots of ways for teens to get graphic @ your library™:

• Read comics and graphic novels.
  
  
• Join a book discussion group at the school or public library, or logon to www.ala.org/teenhoopla.
  
  
• Check out careers in graphic arts.
  
  
• Keep a comic book in your backpack at all times. Use it to read while waiting for the bus, an appointment, or for friends to pick you up.
  
  
• Add a (or another) comic book or graphic novel to your collection.
  
  
• Read what you want to read for the fun of it.
  

-30-

TOP

Sample PSA

:30 seconds

Graphic novels/comic books @ your library™? Yes! They come in a wide range of artistic styles and in a great variety of subjects. They come in color and black and white, in English and other languages, with serious and humorous messages. They encourage reading and appeal to a huge audience from poor and emergent readers to gifted students. They help develop a life long reading habit. And they may lead to a career in the arts.

It’s Teen Read Week—read for the fun of it!

Sponsored by [name of library, school, or bookstore].

TOP

Proclamation

• Whereas, the ability to read and process information is a basic survival skill in our global information society; and

• Whereas, the reading proficiency of teens has remained stagnant over the last thirty years; and

• Whereas, the number of students who can read but choose not to do so is increasing; and

• Whereas, the most effective way to improve reading skills is to read regularly and often; and

• Whereas, too few teens think reading is a valuable tool for enjoyment and relaxation as well as for schoolwork; and

• Whereas, regular daily reading for the fun of it creates the reading habit for life; and

• Whereas, parents, teachers, librarians, and all concerned adults can serve as role models by reading for fun themselves; and

• Now, be it resolved that I (name, title of official) proclaim October 13–19, 2002, Teen Read Week in (name of city, state) and encourage teens to read for the fun of it. . . .

TOP