Great news! We got word today that we won the “All Children Reading: Grand Challenge for Development” Award.

The grant, which will be for up to $300,000, allows us to build on our previous work in Ghana; provide additional books and educational materials in local Ghanaian language and English; expand after-school reading activities, and, of course, measure the impact Kindles have on literacy.

The next phase of our program will focus on primary school students. We’re doing that because, based on our iREAD pilot study learnings, it was clear that the kids in earlier grade levels (younger kids) were reading more and better; this is congruent with research in the field which shows that reading interventions should happen in early grades. Also, we found that local content made a big difference — kids were engaged when they read books that reflected their daily lives. Hence, we’re taking things one step further in both directions by reaching kids in primary 1 – 3, and providing not just local books but also local-language books.

Zev Lowe and Elizabeth Wood with USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah

All Children Reading is a partnership effort by U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), World Vision and the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) to catalyze cost-effective innovations to promote literacy among children in the primary grades in the developing world. Worldreader was selected from a pool of a total of 450 applicants from 20 countries.

What a perfect way to celebrate International Literacy Day! Speaking of International Literacy Day (for twitter fans, use #IntlLitDay and #millionbooks), tomorrow we’ll post a story about 14-year-old Gabriel and what reading means to him. He reminds us of how books and a love of reading help all of us in more ways than we can count. Hope he inspires you as much as he inspired us.

Thank you, All Children Reading (#allchildrenreading), for your support! Books for all!