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(ARA) – America is the most prosperous country on the planet, so it would probably come as a surprise to a lot of people that 15 percent of the population - or 44 million Americans - can hardly read or write. And the problem reaches a lot further than you may think. “Low level literacy impacts just almost every social issue we have in the United States. Individuals with low literacy skills are more likely to live in poverty; their annual health care costs are four times higher; and they are more likely to end up in prison. But teach them to read, and their lives turn around,” says Rochelle Cassella, director of corporate communications for ProLiteracy, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the mission of helping adults and their families acquire the literacy practices and skills they need to function more effectively in their daily lives. “Once they learn how to read, people gain the ability to read bus schedules, browse the classified ads and fill out job applications that used to be off limits for them,” she adds.
Inspired by the work being done by ProLiteracy, and realizing how prominent reading is among its guests, Country Inns & Suites By Carlson implemented a campaign to raise money for the organization. The chain established libraries in all 335 of its hotels in the United States and Canada, offering guests the opportunity to borrow books with an incentive to return them on their next visit.
“The ‘return’ part of the program is on the honor system, and thanks to the incentive, we get most of them back,” says Nancy Johnson, executive vice president of Country Inns & Suites By Carlson. For each title brought back, $5 is donated to ProLiteracy.
Since the launch of “Book It and Return” in January 2001, $60,000 has been raised to help solve the problem of low level literacy. The money goes towards providing technical assistance to local programs that provide one-on-one and group instruction in literacy skills to adult learners.
“We’ve received countless letters from guests who want to express their pleasure with the program,” says Johnson. “A school teacher from Davenport, Iowa, wrote ‘As a teacher of 32 years experience, this is one of the best ideas I’ve ever heard of and I’m going to share it with my faculty.’ We’ve also heard from our hotel managers that people stop in from time to time, even if they don’t have reservations, just to return books because they know doing so will help someone in need.”
To learn more about the “Book It and Return Program,” log on to www.countryinns.com.
Throughout the system of Country Inns & Suites hotels, a variety of fiction, nonfiction and self-help books are on hand for guests to borrow. More information about the ProLiteracy program can be found at www.proliteracy.org.
Courtesy of ARA Content
