The One Book, One Community communitywide reading projects were initiated by the Washington Center for the Book in 1998, and are being introduced across the country and around the world.
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One Book, One Community programs encourage entire communities to read the same book with the goals of promoting reading, sparking dialogue, encouraging understanding and building community. Imagine what your community would be like if everyone read the same book!
While we were in the final stages of completing the book and the accompanying exhibit that would debut at the Canton Museum of Art on September 8 and 9, we were notified by the board of Stark County’s annual One Book, One Community program that Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community was the selected book for their 2006 community reading program. http://www.cantonmayorsliteracycommission.org
The book would be made available to the residents of Stark County through area libraries and distributed to local schools and reading clubs. Although the book was still in the final stages of production, advance orders of more than 800 books were purchased and ultimately distributed to the community.
Since the book was selected, we’ve been able to reach students, seniors, book clubs, libraries, and county residents who were participating in the reading program. 14,000 One Book, One Community brochures were printed and distributed throughout Stark county, as well as hundreds of posters, announcing our book and listing the many panel discussion, workshops, and events scheduled for the month of September and October.
In addition the committee worked closely with the Canton Museum of Art to coordinate their advertising with the museum’s advertising of the exhibit. The CMA was our most important partnership in engaging the community. The exhibit became a central location for the project and numerous events and programs were held at the museum.
In an article in the Canton Repository, Sue March, chairwoman of the One Book, One Community program, said the communitywide effort not only encouraged reading, but also forged bonds among readers who discuss the book with friends, family members, co-workers and community members. Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community, was chosen as the subject of this year’s One Book, One Community program because of its potential to create the kind of discussion that would help the One Book, One Community program meet its mission: “Read, Think, Talk, Listen, Grow.”
As far as we can tell, Growing Season, The Life of a Migrant Community was the only book of images and narrative stories ever selected for this national program.
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