By Melody Newcombe
On the morning of Thursday, Jan. 25 volunteers will be selling the Free Press newspapers by donation at Tim Horton’s. Reach a Reader Day is one of Cariboo Chilcotin Partners for Literacy (CCPL) ways to raise awareness of the importance of keeping our literacy skills up while raising funds for local literacy programs.
So you ask yourself “What the heck is literacy and why does it matter?” Literacy has many different definitions and is forever changing with our changing world. The CCPL’s definition of literacy “is the complex set of skills necessary for daily life, employment, citizenship and personal enjoyment of our modern and diverse society influenced by lifelong learning, changing needs, skills use or retention, and health.”
Why do our literacy skills matter?
Improving our literacy skills helps with every decision we make in our lives.
We live richer, fuller, more joyful lives with higher literacy skills. We are able to understand how world events affect our personal lives like turbulent money markets and rising interest rates. We have the skills to make informed decisions based on the information to make necessary changes in our lives.
With improved literacy skills we make better decisions about our children, our community, our health, our money and our community.
CCPL offers free programs and services to help you with your learning goals. That might be getting your grade 12, a boat license, filling in forms and improving your computer skills.
We help newcomers to the community to learn about all the great things we have in 100 Mile House.
You set the learning goal. Come on out on Thursday, Jan 25 and buy the Free Press newspaper by donation. You can make a difference in a learner’s life!