The power of literacy through magazines

Illiteracy is known to be one of the main contributing factors to the cycle of poverty in America. National non-profit organization MagazineLiteracy has focused its mission on ending this connection.  

Over two-thirds of the United States’s 16 million children living in poverty have no books at home, according to Reading is Fundamental. As a result, children in impoverished households are introduced to 30 million fewer words vital for brain development.

Statistics like these are what drives MagazineLiteracy’s campaign to help at-risk people of all ages expand their knowledge and development through reading. Ultimately the goal is to end the cycle of poverty that illiteracy tends to perpetuate. The organization is the first and only global, industry-wide literacy campaign for children and families.

“Reading is fundamental,” John Mennell, founder and chairman, said. “We learned that most poor kids and families have zero books, and we have the opportunity to fix that today with the enormous volume of reading materials that are available from consumers and publishers.” 

Mennell’s idea for the organization came from years of working with food banks and pantries. Mennell says he realized that the families they were feeding didn’t have access to any reading materials. After seeing that, he knew he wanted to be able to share the magazines he and his family loved with those who didn’t have access to them.

“It just seemed like such a powerful opportunity to deliver reading materials to children and families in the same way we were delivering food,” he said.

MagazineLiteracy collects and delivers magazines and comics to at-risk readers via food pantries, shelters, foster care and job training and mentoring programs. The shorter, less intimidating structure of magazines and comics makes them a powerful tool for literacy for children and adults alike. Pictures and other graphics also help break up the content to help struggling readers. 

The huge variety of topics, languages and age-targeted magazines also allows readers to find  material that fits their interests and keeps them engaged.

This is especially important when more than 1 million students enrolled in schools throughout the country are homeless, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

Since its start in 1994, MagazineLiteracy has opened offices in Madison, New Jersey and Southern Connecticut, where they are able to spread their reach to surrounding cities and states.

Because 100 percent of the donations received go to magazine output, MagazineLiteracy relies heavily on volunteers. One of the main ways the Madison office is able to maintain its magazine flow is through magazine sorting events, which are held the first Sunday of each month. Volunteers sort through the thousands of magazines delivered from around the country so literacy agencies can quickly collect the materials they want and get them into hands to be read.

The organization has collected and delivered hundreds of thousands of magazines and comics to at-risk readers, including via airdrops to groups in places like Croatia and parts of Canada in the Arctic Circle.

The Madison office alone has over 20,000 magazines ready for distribution and thousands more pouring into their office from around the U.S., including a recent donation of 57,000 children’s Highlights magazines, which will be distributed to food pantries and kids programs throughout Wisconsin.

“We all remember our favorite childhood memories reading magazines and comics,” Mennell said. “Adults who are unable to read were once children who did not learn how. We can fix that.”