HOPKINSVILLE, KY (CHRISTIAN COUNTY NOW) – The Real Men Read program is battling the stigma associated with masculinity and reading, while also promoting literacy to kids in Christian County.
“It’s predominately thought that the mothers of the household or the woman of the household is the one who reads to children, and what we are trying to promote to everybody is that there’s a lot of men out there who read and enjoy reading,” said Joey Renshaw from the Literacy Council. He is the board president with the council and a participant in the Real Men Read program.
Real Men Read is one of the longer running programs from the Christian County Literacy Council. They assemble a group of male volunteers every school year and pick dates to visit classrooms in Christian County to read to students. In 2022, 20 volunteers read to over 400 students between preschool and third grade.
The main goal of the Literacy Council has always been promoting literacy to local youth. “We want to go into schools and let these kids know that the people in the community care about them and know they matter,” Renshaw said. “We care about them doing well in school and growing up to be good citizens because the future of Christian County is those children that are in our school system right now.”
How to volunteer
“I’ve had the opportunity to read in my children’s classes, and my friends who have children’s classes … and go to my old elementary school and read with some of my teachers that were there when I was a student. It’s just a great program,” Renshaw said.
He finds that most volunteers join the program after hearing about it from others who have participated, and they are always looking for more men to participate. For 2023, they are hoping to focus on first and second grade classrooms in Christian County and are looking for volunteers for their first read coming up in January.
The Literacy Council is also looking for volunteers for Community Reader Day coming up Nov. 17. This program is open to all volunteers, not just men, with the goal of putting a reader in every classroom in Christian County.
See more about the programs with the Literacy Council on their Facebook page, and sign up to volunteer on their website.