Promoting Reading

by Lindsay Davis

A couple of weeks ago, we shared this photo that was originally posted on the Vintage Books & Anchor Books Facebook page. It generated interest and shock. We also thought it might not be accurate, and we found a 2014 revision. Read this to get the inner scoop. It isn’t as “juicy” as the first version, is it? (Let this also be a lesson in verifying information and not spreading misinformation. More on that later this week…)

Here are two share-worthy resources from Pew and Gallup that paint a different picture on the state of reading.

In 2014, the Pew Research Center released “Younger Americans and Public Libraries.” In the report, 88 percent of Americans younger than 30 said they read a book in the past year compared with 79 percent of those older than 30. You can read the short version from The Atlantic’s overview, “Millennials are Out-Reading Older Generations.” In a poll that was conducted in December 2016, Gallup found that 48 percent of Americans ages 65+ read 1 to 10 books in the last year and 53 percent of Americans ages 18-29 read 1-10 books in the last year. Read more about the findings in “Rumors of the Demise of Books Greatly Exaggerated.”

How do you promote reading at your community or junior college library? Do you have partnerships with the local public library? Contests? Displays? Book clubs? Let us know in the comments.