Lansing Reading Is Fundamental (RIF)

Mission: To motivate all children to discover the joy of reading which will then evolve into lifetime personal reading habits, developing readers who are educated and informed members of the community.

Our goals are to provide free new books to Lansing School District children three times a year, including free choice of books, activities promoting reading as a lifetime behavior, and active parental involvement. We have been in the Lansing School District since 1975 and during that time have distributed nearly 3 million free quality paperback books to the children of the district. We started with two grades in four schools. Our program is now for all schools through 12th grade.

We provide Lansing School District schools with three book distributions a year. Each time, all the children (from pre-primary through tenth grade) get to choose, own and carry home to their families a book selected from our large variety of quality titles. By providing books to children, we support RIF’s fundamental premise: Children who have access to a greater array of reading materials in their home and who read for pleasure become better readers.

Our program is supported by volunteers drawn from families, the community, and school district staff. These volunteers work with Lansing RIF to provide reading motivational activities for all of the children and to distribute the books to them in their schools. We also arrange for opportunities designed to expand the horizons of our students by relating the love of reading to other events. Activities include a theater event in partnership with the Riverwalk Theatre, author visits, and presentations by experts in various arenas (recently we have had storytellers, service dog trainers, and chefs). Each activity is related to reading and books and, where affordable, is accompanied by a distribution of books related to the presentation.