Insight
The Essex Year of Reading was a £1 million campaign set-up to support children whose education had been affected by the Covid 19 pandemic. The campaign encouraged children to read regularly, both for fun and to improve their reading skills, so that every pupil who leaves school was able to read at their age group or above.
Implementation
To drive ultimate impact, we partnered with Essex-born TV presenter and author, Dermot O’Leary, to launch the campaign. A school visit was staged with invited press; Dermot read from his latest book and gave an assembly talk. In the afternoon Dermot went live online to over 230 Essex primary schools with a reading and Q&A session. The media interviewed Dermot and an ECC councillor talked about the campaign’s aims.
Following the launch, we needed to continue the momentum. A calendar of events had been developed, with a focus on levelling-up areas. The events all needed to create excellent reading habits for children:
- Schoolchildren in Basildon received special visits from dementia patients (become reading partners)
- Visits from author Michael Rosen (in Basildon) and rapper Christian Foley (in Harlow)
- Isolated communities received special visits from mobile libraries
- New library cards were distributed in schools, libraries and community venues
- Interviews set up with councillors and key participants at every stage of the campaign
We also pioneered additional events to keep the campaign fresh:
- Set-up book swap events in schools to ensure everyone had access to a book.
- We launched a series of ‘Tell Me A Story’ YouTube storytelling sessions. Gained stories from Colchester Zoo to Essex Fire Service plus well-known faces gave their time to read to the children of Essex
All events were promoted via an on-going stream of news releases, press interviews, plus film and photo opportunities.
Impact
The launch was covered by BBC Look East, BBC Essex, ITV Anglia, Heart and l print media.
Thousands of school children attended the online event with Dermot O’Leary.
The campaign resulted in over 200 media items, with 99.5% mentioning the campaign brand.
160,000 library cards distributed to schools
13 storytellers stepped forward and filmed their own ‘Tell me a Story’. The films received up to 600 views per film.
50 schools signed-up to the book swap initiative.
The Essex Year of Reading has a lasting legacy – some children’s reading ages increased by 2 years and 2 months!
When Colchester gained city status, the Essex Year of Reading was chosen as an exemplar community project – King Charles III’s and Queen Camilla’s visit to the city included a visit to Colchester Library and the Queen met the Essex Year of Reading team.
The campaign won three CIPR Pride awards.
“It was a great campaign. We all worked well together and, more importantly, it was fun!”
