I’ve been a book reader for as long as I can remember. I have an ability to get completely lost in a story. I can hear the dialects the author has embraced. I can smell the tobacco in a field of its leaves. I can feel the cotton brush across my cheek as the wind blows through a tall old cottonwood tree.

This love for the written word started when I was a child, like it does for so many. I can remember well a large collection of books always at my disposal. Not all of them were necessarily age appropriate but they were classics like rich Edgar Allen Poe and Emily Dickinson poetry or the wonderfully human elements of Ernest Hemingway’s, The Old Man and the Sea. While I eventually consumed and embraced just about everything that was set in front of me it is the likes of Curious George and Dr. Seuss that started it all.

Unfortunately not all kids have access to books like I, and so many of you, did. Thankfully there are programs like Jumpstart, and more specifically the Jumpstart Read for the Record program, that are doing a fine job to fill this gap and make books available to those that would otherwise not have them.

I’ve been aware of the Jumpstart program for quite some time though the Read for the Record campaign is new to me. What is this campaign you ask? From the FAQ:

Jumpstart’s Read for the Record is a campaign designed to bring attention to the importance of early education.  By encouraging hundreds of thousands of children and adults to read the same book (Corduroy) on the same day (October 2, 2008), Jumpstart aims to break a world record and to make early education a national priority.

Children and adults will read together at events nationwide on October 2, in schools, libraries, stores, hotels, playgrounds, offices, and homes.

That’s all well and good you might say, but how is setting this record supposed to help kids that don’t have access to books? The idea is for folks to buy a copy of the Corduroy book through the Jumpstart program. This small purchase of $8.99 will lead to many books being made available to children who would not normally have them. 100% of the purchase goes toward the Jumpstart program. Not a paltry 50% or 80% but 100%. This is a big deal.

As a special thank you, The Pearson Foundation will match your donation with a donation of our own. For each copy of Corduroy you secure now, the Pearson Foundation will donate an additional copy of Corduroy to an at-risk preschooler in your name so that he or she too can help set the record on October 2^nd.

As if this wasn’t enough you also have an opportunity to host or attend one of the book reading events. When I searched for an event near our hometown I came up empty. When changing the search to bring back anything in the state the result was a few hits listing the events and associated info. It would be nice to see this list grow. It seems every library and book store should be jumping on this opportunity.

If I may, I’d like to present you with a few stats to further encourage your participation.

• On average, children in economically depressed communities have 0-2 age appropriate books in their homes.
• 36% of low-income families have no books at all in their homes for their children.
• 50% of all children from low-income families start first grade up to two years behind their peers in preschool skills.
• Children who have not already developed some basic literacy practices when they enter school are 3-4 times more likely to drop out in later years.

In contrast …

• Children in high-income communities have an average of 199 age appropriate books in their homes.
• A child from a middle-income family enters kindergarten with a listening vocabulary of 20,000 words. A child from a low-income family enters with 5,000 words.

I’m willing to bet the chances are pretty good that you’ll blow $8.99 (plus $3 shipping) on some random purchase in the next several days. Wouldn’t you rather commit that money to something that matters? Something that may just crack a window of opportunity for some child or family? That sounds awfully dramatic, I know, but books did mean that much to me as a child and I can’t have been the only one.