South Yorkshire Libraries and Shared Reading; One Year On

Shaun Laurence, People and Project Manager South Yorkshire Project Lead at The Reader tells us about growing the Reading Revolution in South Yorkshire.

It seems only yesterday that a new project in South Yorkshire was launched, but it’s now been a whole year since library services in Doncaster, Rotherham and Sheffield joined forces to bring Shared Reading to their districts.

As a South Yorkshireman who has been Reader staff member for 5 years, I jumped at the chance to work with this exciting partnership of library services who were working together in this manner for the first time.

From zero to 18 groups, with some 38 volunteer Reader Leaders being trained, South Yorkshire is now a burgeoning hub of Shared Reading, with groups meeting in libraries, care homes, and drop in centres; a wonderful achievement which is definitely worth celebrating, so that’s what we’re doing this month.

I’ve worked with the South Yorkshire Shared Reading Organisers to put together a celebration event in each of their districts, which will bring our volunteers together to read, reflect on their amazing work and look to the future.

The first event is taking place in Rotherham on Wednesday 11th September, with the others happening in Sheffield on 24th and Doncaster on 25th September. Each event is open to volunteers from either district so as to help build on the already strong sense of community in the region, and group members are being invited along too.

And of course, I’ll be taking photos to share with the wider Reader community so watch this space for more after the events.