Ten-year-old Cassie-Ella, a pupil at Millbrook primary in Newport, south Wales, summed up the transformation of her school’s library neatly: “When I take a book off the shelf now, it’s not covered in cobwebs and mould.”
Millbrook’s library has been moved from the corner of a classroom into a prime spot in the school hall and is a bright, airy place filled with new books, beanbags, even the school dog, Taliesin (named after a sixth-century bard), all designed to provide a perfect place for a good read.
The library is among the first to be revamped as part of a campaign by the new Primary School Library Alliance to transform 1,000 school libraries across the UK by 2025. The alliance – a union between the National Literacy Trust and Penguin Random House UK launched last November – is tackling a chronic lack of investment in school libraries.
