About Read Woke

The Read Woke challenge was developed by Media Specialist Cicely Lewis in Georgia, USA in 2017. Motivated by the political climate in America and seeing students grapple with issues of social injustice on a daily basis, Cicely realised the need for them to be empowered with knowledge. Knowledge about the issues they (and others) face and knowledge about their own rights. Read Woke is a programme to educate through reading. Cicely developed a set of criteria for a book to be considered "woke", and set out to get students reading.
She concluded that a woke book must:

• Challenge a social norm

• Give voice to the voiceless

• Provide information about a group that has been disenfranchised

• Seek to challenge the status quo

• Have a protagonist from an underrepresented or oppressed group

Read more on Cicely's Read Woke website.

We have followed this movement with huge interest and were delighted to be able to bring Read Woke to Scotland. We passionately believe that every person that walks through any library door should be able to find books that represent them and we are determined to develop diverse collections within our libraries. We also know that books have power! They provide a gateway to seeing the world through different eyes. Participating in the Read Woke challenge will awaken our students to a range of important issues, enlighten them, and encourage them to think critically and with empathy when forming opinions.

We are grateful to the Scottish Library and Information Council for funding our Read Woke project in all South Ayrshire secondary school libraries through the School Library Improvement Fund (2020-2021). We launched our initial book list in May 2021 and additional titles for the 2021-22 school year were added in November 2021, creating a booklist of 30 books. Participants in our secondary schools submit a short book review on completing a book and are rewarded with an exclusive Read Woke pin on reaching the milestones of four and eight books.

Visit our Read Woke Secondary school website here.

Read Woke South Ayrshire Primaries is launching in 10 primary schools in January 2021. We are empowering our students to engage with social justice issues and to stand up for the rights of themselves and others. Rather than challenge individuals, our primary school challenge will be focussed at a class level and will have a greater focus of tying in the inclusive strategies in the Curriculum For Excellence. This means that teachers will facilitate discussions and ensure that everyone can learn in an inclusive and productive learning environment. The books that we will use for this project will stay true to the values and criteria set out by Cicely Lewis, founder of Read Woke.This project has been supported by through the School Library Improvement Fund (2021-22) and the funding is being used in several ways:

• Purchasing a range of class sets of novels to allow teachers to immerse their classes in the books and stories at the core of this project. These books will explore different issues and identities.

• We are significantly upgrading our library stock in each school to be more representative of local communities and the wider world. Our carefully curated Read Woke Primaries Library collection will help normalise diversity and representation when students are browsing the collections. Every child deserves to see characters that look like them have amazing adventures in books!

• We are working with a number of other organisations to get inspirational speakers and positive role models into our schools either in person or virtually. This includes working with a number of authors to produce short bespoke masterclass and challenge videos.

• We are working to deliver a number of staff CPD sessions to our staff about equitable teaching, anti-racism and addressing internal bias.