In the 2022-2023 school year, Briar Woods’ Student Literacy Council (SLC) seemingly disappeared without a trace. There was no warning, nor an official goodbye from its officers. But now in this very school year, the next generation of students is taking the call to action and reviving the club. Spearheaded by junior Akshaya Poliboyina, the new and improved SLC is in its very beginning stages at the moment.
Poliboyina shares what prompted her to start the club again. She talks about her love for books when she was younger, but she admits as she got older “I didn’t really see reading as an outlet or relaxation, more like a chore. But when I got to tenth grade, I started reading more for leisure and I realized that I wanted to start Student Literacy Council again because I know a lot of people are just like me where they probably lost their love for reading some time in middle school.”
She goes on to talk about how the club is running under her leadership, saying “we’re going to have volunteer opportunities, which is major for a lot of kids I know, and one [for example] is going to be a book drive where you can donate books for volunteering hours, we’re going to have little tutoring sessions where you can tutor kids for free at the library in english. And then, we’re also making it more interactive so after you finish a book, we can have a little party or we can play games during book meetings.”
Junior Kirsten Essampong holds the position of secretary in SLC. Explaining her role, she says “As secretary I’m in charge of taking attendance, logging in [members’] hours, helping to come up with club ideas, and reaching out for volunteer opportunities.” She too shares the sentiment that the joy of reading has unfortunately faded over the years.
“The leisure time of reading has really fallen off ever since high school, so with this club, I really hope to make reading more fun through our parties [and] our discussions [they’re] a fun way to go back to that middle school reading time where it was more for your benefit and less for the grade.”
As for what Poliboyina hopes to achieve through the club, she says “I hope that a lot of people join and discover their passion for reading if they lost it like I did. And maybe even if they didn’t have a passion for reading, discovering one. And also, create volunteer opportunities because it’s not just about college, in general it’s really good to volunteer and help little kids out and others.”
In a statistic from Wisevoter, the literacy rate in the state of Virginia is 81.2%, ranking it as the 26th most literate state in the U.S. Now back and better than ever, the SLC hopes to facilitate local literacy through their efforts. Even if there is a small impact, there is an impact nonetheless.
