The National Literacy Trust has partnered with London-based charity, The Portal Trust, to help improve library and reading spaces in primary schools across the capital.
Initially in Lambeth, the first year of the three-year programme, will work with nine primary schools, providing them with new reading spaces, teacher training and 300 books.
The Portal Trust also joins Chase, Arts Council England, Oxford University Press and the Marcus Rashford Bookclub as a flagship partner of the Primary School Library Alliance- a unique cross-sector, multi-partner collaboration, founded in November 2021 by the National Literacy Trust and Penguin Random House UK, that works to address the chronic lack of investment in primary school libraries.
Jonathan Douglas CBE, CEO at the National Literacy Trust said: “We know that 1 in 7 primary schools in England do not have a library and over three-quarters of a million children in the UK do not have access to books that we know enable better educational outcomes and greater well-being. Through the Primary School Library Alliance, we aim to transform 1,000 primary school libraries by 2025.
“We are delighted to be partnering with The Portal Trust and delivering these exciting reading spaces, resources and training in primary schools across London, and helping children develop a love of reading that will benefit them now and later on in life.”
Richard Foley, CEO at The Portal Trust, said: “The Portal Trust is delighted to be collaborating with the National Literacy Trust in London and to have joined the Primary School Library Alliance and believes that all primary schools should have their own library.
We believe it is important for children’s cognitive skills to have access to books and a library at an early age. The Trust has engaged with all primary schools across our beneficial area through the Portal Trust Library Survey and we are pleased to have awarded an initial three-year grant to support nine primary schools in Lambeth”