It's been a busy year for Reading Activists across the country with young people organising events, interviewing authors, learning new skills and much much more. There is one Reading Activist who we would like to say a special thank you to and award the title of Reading Activist of the year - congratulations Jade from Warrington!

Prize winner

Here's what Reading Activist Project leader, Chris Everett said about Jade:

"Sixteen year old Jade has been a Reading Activist since the very beginning of the project. She rarely misses a meeting and is a reliable and mature member of our group. She is a great organiser, and is well known for her strength - she can re-arrange a room for an event with brute strength quicker than Superman!

Jade is honest with her opinions. She enjoys reading and frequently tells other Reading Activists about books she has enjoyed. She is a great advocate for libraries and the Reading Activists project.

She is a talented writer and had her short story published in the anthology Head in the Clouds after attending workshops run by The Writing Squad. She is also very artistic and has really enjoyed creating canvasses to brighten up our meeting space. When others have failed to finish their canvasses, she has taken them on as well!

Her cheerleading prowess helped to make a prize winning Vine for the Reading Activists digital challenge earlier this year.

Jade is a great organiser and rallied the other members of the group to take part in the marshmallow challenge. She has helped plan, deliver and evaluate many of our author events, including events with Gregg Olsen and Tim Quinn.

Jade has acquired many new skills through the project and her confidence has grown and her reading widened. She is enthusiastic, full of energy and ideas, caring and does so much for her local library despite being really busy at school with her GCSEs.

Jade is thrilled to be Reading Activist of the year. Here's what she had to say:

"I wasn't expecting to do something for fun and then win something for doing it."

Our runner up

We would also like to congratulate our runner up, fifteen year old Stephanie from St Helens.

Reading Activist project leader, Kathryn Boothroyd told us that, out of all the young people, "Steph has developed the most during her time with Reading Activists. She started out as very shy member of the group, but over time, she has matured, grown in confidence and now takes on responsibilities.

She has organised events and activities, learnt to balance a budget, and acted as a mentor to younger children. She has contributed well to all activities, particularly the Instagram project, which was entirely her work. She chose the book and submitted the brief that was used to create the video."

Jade has won a trip for three people to London to see a musical of her choice plus travel and a night in a hotel and Stephanie has won £100 for a book trolley dash for the teen section of her library.

We hope both Jade and Stephanie will continue to enjoy being involved in Reading Activists and we look forward to hearing about all their achievements.

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Interested in building your CV through volunteering or like the idea of meeting new friends whilst helping out at your local library? Find out more about Reading Activists and what you can do for yourself and for your local community.