Young Middlesbrough fans offered free books to boost literacy levels in the area
Young Middlesbrough football fans have been offered free books ahead of the game against Reading at the Riverside Stadium.
The club has teamed up with the National Literacy Trust to offer around 400 books to schoolchildren from the area on match day.
Research by the trust has found that 1 in 15 children from disadvantaged backgrounds in the North East do not own a single book of their own at home.
It comes in the week that schools from across the region celebrated World Book Day.
Parents at the game thought it was a good idea. One father said: "Reading is really important for education and, you know, it opens the world up to children, so I think it’s really important."
Another added: "I think it’s a really good idea. You just see kids a lot on tablets and phones. It’s nice for them to read a bool. It’s something else, rather than looking at a screen all the time."
With child poverty rates in the North East among the highest in the country, using events like football games, enables the trust to make literacy and reading more accessible to children who might not always have the opportunity to access literature.
Allison Potter from the National Literacy Trust's Middlesbrough Reads campaign said: "Being able to promote reading and the importance of being able to read and the love of books, alongside the passion for football, it’s a win win situation, so you get a captive audience who are then being surrounded by books and book choices at various opportunities throughout the season."
Yvonne Ferguson, Head of Supporter Services for Middlesbrough FC, added: "It’s not an affluent area so, where possible, we try to encourage children to do the activities in the family zone that links into the school curriculum and again reading is important. Because they get the book from the football club, they go home and read it. So, they might have got the same book from a school, but they’re not interested in it, but they got it from the football club, and the club is a huge part of the community."