The United States is facing a literacy crisis, now ranking 36th in literacy among 184 countries, according to the 2024 World Population Review, and a recent Digest of Education Statistics report said that 66% of 4th-grade students in Georgia were not proficient at reading.
To help improve these disturbing statistics, the 2024 fall fundraising effort for Putnam Reads with Ferst Readers is underway to provide local children from birth to age five with one age-appropriate book per month for a complete year.
A tax-deductible donation of $42 to either Putnam Reads with Ferst Readers or to Ferst Readers of Greene County will deliver 12 new books over the next year to a child in their respective communities.
Early reading pays off later in life, too. Remarkably, 21% of adults in the U.S. are considered illiterate in 2024. Research shows that adult illiteracy directly affects an individual’s employment options as well as their likelihood of living in poverty or being incarcerated, their access to adequate health care and health outcomes, and even life expectancy. Generational illiteracy makes it increasingly difficult to escape these circumstances.
While Putnam Reads and Ferst Readers cannot address all issues of illiteracy, it can eliminate one reason given for why parents do not read to their children: the unavailability of quality books in the home. As a community and as parents, we owe every child the reading chance to succeed. Please consider adopting a reader this holiday season – or even more than one!
In Putnam County, please make checks payable to Putnam Reads and mail them to P.O. Box 4283, Eatonton, Ga. 31024; or in Greene County, make checks payable to Ferst Readers (please insert “Greene County” on the memo line) and mail to P.O. Box 111, Greensboro, Ga. 30642.
- Contributed