“It's really special to walk into a Room to Read library and see a space designed for children, with bookshelves at students' eye level, furniture designed for small children, and vibrant colors all over the walls and floor.”
Founded in 2000, Room to Read envisions a world free from illiteracy and gender inequality, where all children have room to read, learn, and grow. Over 25 years, their work has really been mainly supporting two critical sections of childhood: acquiring early literacy skills and then staying in school for their whole school journeys. Since its founding in Nepal, Room to Read has expanded to 24 countries, benefiting 45 million children to date, including five million in the past year alone. This exponential growth underscores the organisation's dedication to promoting equity and equality in education.
We celebrate the outstanding work of Room to Read as they join our Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame is a special recognition by HundrED for education innovations that have consistently demonstrated growth in impact and scalability while being responsive to the evolving needs of education worldwide.
Making Space and Room for Children to Learn and Grow
One of the core work of Room to Read is to create libraries and provide children the access to reading materials in their native languages or reflective of their lived experiences. In Room to Read libraries, there are books on every wall, and students can enjoy exploring and reading in a very colourful and engaging environment focused on students, promoting what they call ‘dignity in learning.’ Through a holistic and dignified approach in creating a learning space, they focus on improving students’ learning outcomes in both skills and habits of reading.
The Impacts of a Quarter of a Century of Implementation
Room to Read has achieved remarkable outcomes over its 25 years of work. In the area of early literacy, improving the lack of access to reading materials in pupils’ native languages that reflect their lives, Room to Read focused on creating locally developed culturally relevant resources. Students in Room to Read programs demonstrate fluency improvements two to three times higher than their peers who are not part of these programs.
The program has also significantly reduced the proportion of students who are completely illiterate. Additionally, Room to Read fosters a habit of reading; in 2020 alone, students checked out 3.5 million books from their libraries, often exceeding the program's goal of eight books per student annually.
Over the years, the Literacy Program grew with the understanding that learning is more than just access to reading materials. To ensure students’ quality learning and continuous professional development for teachers, Room to Read also trains teachers to be able to guide instruction, utilize reading materials, and facilitate reading activities to foster students’ reading skills and habits that nurture lifelong learning.
"Across many countries globally, there is not room created for children. Spaces are not designed for children. Education is not given to children.”
As children move out of early literacy and primary school, many struggle to remain in school as they pursue secondary education, particularly girls. With a growing understanding of the challenges girls face in continuing their education beyond primary school—such as household duties, early marriage, and traditional responsibilities around their communities—Room to Read launched a Girls’ Education Program. This initiative supports girls to keep them in school through secondary school, equipping them with life skills to pursue tertiary education or enter the workforce.
The Girls’ Education Program has also demonstrated measurable impacts. Girls in the program are 25% less likely to drop out compared to their peers, with overall dropout rates as low as 4-5%, far below the 30-40% seen in similar contexts. The program tracks post-secondary success, with many graduates enrolling in higher education or securing employment within a year of graduation.
Key Milestones in Scaling Impacts
One of Room to Read’s standout achievements is the transition from its Deliver Model—a direct, school-focused approach—to the Accelerate Model, which involves scaling through government partnerships. This shift allows Room to Read to impact a larger number of students by influencing national curricula, policies, and teacher training systems.
Cambodia and Vietnam represent successful large-scale integration for Room to Read. In Vietnam, the literacy program is incorporated into national library policies with the ministry implementing their library program expansion, while Cambodia’s partnership promotes quality library programming and nationwide implementation of model libraries and work in teacher training colleges. These collaborations with governments enable Room to Read to extend its reach and amplify its impact on education systems.
As Room to Read has achieved Vision 2025, they are currently finalising a three year strategic direction focusing on scaling and future partnerships. They envision doubling the number of active children and communities, benefiting from Room to Read materials and approaches by the end of 2027. Aiming to grow at least 20 million children annually, and more than 400,000 communities annually.
“We work in some contexts like in Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh, where the access to education is very difficult in a refugee environment, it is important to make space and to make room for children and young adults who need to learn and grow because if you lose that foundation, the rest of your life trajectory becomes more difficult if you don't have that foundation of learning and literacy and life, as life education life outcomes. So, we would say making space and room for children is quite critical.”
Jennifer concludes by emphasing the critical role of education in improving the other areas of global challenges, such as reducing child mortality, promoting climate justice, and decreasing poverty. “So often education can get lost in the funding arena. There's different demands on international development funding that can go to health or climate change and all things are important, but education really has a huge basis in whether or not children can achieve other life outcomes. Education is the basis and the foundation for achieving other things in life and without proper funding for education, it's difficult to impact in other sectors as it's all intertwined.”
