National Health Executive: A different kind of medicine
Could literature improve the quality of life of those with mental health conditions? According to Jane Davis, founder and director of The Reader, the evidence for this is clear – and the NHS stands to benefit the most.
Medicine wasn’t at the forefront of my mind in The Reader’s formative days back in 2001; if anything, the foundations had been built on education. I’d been teaching English Literature at the University of Liverpool, and my personal experiences had taught me that great literature was a useful human resource which could help people living lives full of difficulty – today, we might call it developing resilience.
Published on National Health Executive, Wednesday 2 May, 2018.
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Start your Shared Reading Story
Thank you for expressing an interest in volunteering with The Reader. Your details have been sent to our team; we’ll be in touch as soon as possible using your preferred mode of contact. In the meantime, here’s some things you can do to start your Shared Reading story.
1 – Visit a group
If you aren’t an existing group member or haven’t dropped into a session yet; before training, we ask volunteers to attend an open community Shared Reading group. Groups are always free to attend and there is no need to book. Find your closest group here.
You can also get an idea of how a group works with this group snapshot video:
2 – Complete our application form
If you’ve already visited a Shared Reading group and are interested in training to become a volunteer Reader Leader, we’ll ask you to complete our application form. One of the team will email this to you, but you can also download it here if you want to make a start.
3 – Book your training session
All our volunteer Reader Leaders receive full training from our exciting and invigorating Read to Lead course – find out more about Read to Lead here.
Our courses are flexible and can be attended over three consecutive days or one-day foundation day plus three half day workshops (evenings and weekends are available).
We run multiple training courses each week. Once we’ve received your completed application we’ll be able to get you booked onto a course where you can continue your Shared Reading story.
If you have any questions please do get in touch, email volunteer@thereader.org.uk or give us a call on 0151 729 2200.
