PRESS RELEASE: STORYMOJA READ ALOUD BREAKS THE WORLD RECORD!

The Storymoja Read Aloud final official tally has unofficially broken the World Record for Most People Reading Aloud from the Same Text at the Same Time from Different Venues!

The Storymoja Read Aloud held on June 15, 2015 managed to rally together 229,043 children from 1,097 schools across 44 counties. This number does not take into account the number of teachers, volunteers and reading ambassadors who joined up with the children to read aloud from the text of ‘Attack of the Shidas’. [Photos from the June 15 Read Aloud]

The current world record is held by the USA with 223,363 people in 909 venues.

The previous Storymoja Read Aloud Tally for the event held on January 30, 2015 was 160,190 children from 422 schools in 12 counties.

The Storymoja Read Aloud is part of activities held by Storymoja and Start-a-Library to excite children about reading for pleasure.

Start a Library also works to increase access to books by forming or stocking libraries in Primary Schools. This is in reaction to the fact that countrywide, there are more than 20,000 Kenyan primary schools without libraries. That means that only 2% of public schools have libraries!

We work with partners to remedy this situation. Our most recent library partner, the Varkey Foundation has joined hands with us to stock a total of 22 libraries with 1000 books each. Each of the schools benefitting from the Varkey Foundation partnership also receives a furbished container room with book shelves and a librarian’s desk and chair.

Start a Library also runs reading clubs in schools. Our reading revolutionary teams help to start these up and run them in partnership with school management and volunteer reading ambassadors.

Individual and corporate organizations can sign up to donate books and funds to the Start a Library project as well as donate time to help run reading clubs as well as participate in the Read Aloud events.

Corporate Organisations can sign up by writing in to startalibrary@storymojaafrica.co.ke. Individual volunteers can sign up by filling in a form on startalibrary.org/site.­­

The next Storymoja Read Aloud will be held on the last week of January 2016. We hope that with your assistance and support, we can rally 1,000,000 participants across the country to read aloud with us!

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For More Information please contact:

Storymoja Communications Liaison: James Momanyi

Email: momanyi@storymojaafrica.co.ke

Phone Number: 0722472963