Reports Database:
Cultural Value: Assessing the intrinsic value of The Reader Organisation’s Shared Reading Scheme

“The Reader Organisation’s mission is to create environments where personal responses to books are freely shared in reading communities in every area of life. Beginning life as a small outreach unit at the University of Liverpool in 1997, TRO was established as a national charity in 2008 and has pioneered the weekly ‘read aloud’ model at the heart of its Get into Reading Project (GiR), now known as Shared Reading. The GiR model is based on small groups (2–12 people), formed to read aloud together short stories, novels and poetry. The Reader currently has 70 full-time employees and delivers over 360 groups, in a range of health and social care settings (community centres, libraries, homeless shelters, schools, hospitals, offices, doctors’ surgeries, prisons, drug rehab units and care homes) across the UK, with an annual turnover of £2.1 million, 70% of which is generated by commissions from health authorities etc.”