CoEd’s newest project, the Culture of Reading Program (CORP), aims to create a culture of reading and promote literacy at the primary school level in rural Guatemala. Currently, a CORP pilot serves 250 Mayan youths in Santa Cruz La Laguna, in Guatemala’s impoverished Western Highlands. The program will expand to two additional communities in February 2009.

CoEd believes that a culture of reading in rural Guatemala begins with early intervention in the lives of Mayan children. Most reading instruction at the primary school level involves rote memorization, which fails to actively engage children. The problem is compounded by the lack of reading materials available to students, both in the classroom and at home. CORP addresses these disparities by providing critical resources—including books and teacher training on effective reading instruction—to primary grade classrooms. Students also learn to hone their reading skills through the writing of their own stories, which become part of the classroom library. In these ways, rural Guatemalan children will develop an active, lifelong interest in reading and develop critical thinking skills that will undergird their future academic and professional endeavors.