Teen Read Week is an adolescent literacy initiative of the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), the fastest-growing division of the American Library Association. YALSA welcomes Nonprofit Supporters, Promotional Partners, and Corporate Sponsors to help support this literacy program. The National Corporate Sponsor for 2007 is Mirrorstone Books, an imprint of Wizards of the Coast. Partners for 2007 include: Harcourt Trade, HarperCollins, Hyperion, Listening Library, Little Brown and Co. Books for Young Readers,  Penguin Books for Young Readers,Scholastic, and World Wrestling Entertainment. Nonprofit supporting organizations include: American Association of School Administrators, American Booksellers Association, Cable in the Classroom, International Reading Association, Kids Care, Kidsnet, The N, National Association of Secondary School Principals, National Council of Teachers of English, National Education Association, National School Boards Association, SmartGirl.org, Speak Up Press, Swept Away TV/The Rock Star Stories, and TeenInk.

Teen Read Week is a national literacy initiative aimed at teens, their parents, librarians, educators, booksellers and other concerned adults. It began in 1998 and is celebrated the third week in October. "Teens deserve a wide horizon of books," says author Naomi Shihab Nye. She continues, "They read and the world opens up." The main theme for the Teen Read Week initiative is "Read For The Fun Of It," with a subtheme that changes each year serves as a basis for developing programs in schools, public libraries, bookstores and other places where teens gather. For 2007 the subtheme is LOL @ your library.®

 Where

At thousands of public and school libraries, classrooms, and bookstores everywhere.

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the number of 17-year-olds who reported never or hardly ever reading for fun rose from 9% in 1984 to 19% in 2004. The percentage of 17-year-olds who read daily dropped from 31% to 22 %. At the same time, students who indicated that they read for fun almost every day had higher average reading scores in 2004 than those who said that they never or hardly ever read for fun. Additionally, teens have a wide variety of activities to choose from when deciding how to spend their free time; research shows that reading skills get rusty when they are not used.

The solution is as easy as 1-2-3:

1. Set aside a regular time for teens to read for the fun of it.
   
   
2. Provide teens with a wide variety of reading material and allow them to a make their own selections.
   
   
3. Model good reading habits to help teens get in the habit of 
   reading regularly and often.

Access our web site at www.ala.org/teenread, or contact us at (800) 545-2433 x 4391, or yalsa@ala.org for more information.

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