NEW DELHI, August 24: Hindustan Times has won a Special Mention award at the 2005 World Young Reader Prizes awarded by the World Association of Newspapers (WAN). The prize was given to HT's project " Learning for Life Aajivan Shiksha", produced by HT PACE ? the Hindustan Times NIE programmme.
WAN said: "This is the latest in the illustrious series from the newspaper that has accomplished a great deal in a relatively short NIE career. PACE consistently offers innovative and grand campaigns that effectively promote the newspaper, generate enthusiasm among young people while also developing their reading abilities."
The publication for which HT Pace was awarded the prize was Hindustan, the Hindi daily from the HT establishment which has an estimated circulation of 2 lakh in the Delhi region.
The Irish Independent and The Limpopo Mirror newspaper in South Africa were jointly awarded the 2005 World Young Reader Prize by the WAN. La Prensa of Panama received a Jury Commendation, while a Special Mention award also went to the Record of Hackensack, New Jersey in the United States.
Annapoorna Sehgal, Head of PACE, said the project was carried out over five weeks ? from April 11 to May 14 ? this year across 22 schools in and around Delhi. The project covered almost 1,500 students and the average age of the audience was 11 years. "Since the basic project audience comprised first generation learners, parents formed the secondary audience for the project," Sehgal said. About 3,000 parents were covered.
Parents of the target audience were initially apprehensive and resistant to the idea of a newspaper being used in the classroom to augment the curriculum. To overcome this hurdle, parents of the students concerned were included in the project. The parents benefited from the customised workshops on family health and hygiene, adolescent issues, parenting, postal savings schemes, among other things.
The project's objectives were to encourage newspaper reading/usage; to improve literacy levels i.e. the ability to read, write and spell, through all supporting activities; to focus on adult literacy by including parents as the secondary target audience; to use the reach and affordability of newspapers as a powerful forum for addressing civic and community issues; and to strengthen the newspaper’s corporate social responsibility profile.
Bulk newspapers were delivered directly to schools by the newspaper's circulation and despatch departments. Every morning, teachers received the bundles and distributed the newspapers among the students in the classrooms. Students filed away their individual copies. The entire project cost of Rs 1 lakh ($2,325) was met through the sponsorship received from Nokia India.
On the sustainability of the project, Sehgal mentioned the Delhi minister for education, Arvinder Singh's endorsement of the project and urged the state government to step in to take this project forward on a much larger scale given the infrastructure and wealth of resources required to do so.
WAN awards the World Young Reader Prize annually to the newspaper or newspapers that devise the most innovative projects to develop young readership. This year's awards, supported by the Norwegian paper producer Norske Skog, will be presented at the WAN World Young Reader Conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to be held from September 18-21, 2005.
The Paris-based WAN, the global organisation for the newspaper industry, represents 18,000 newspapers; its membership includes 72 national newspaper associations, individual newspaper executives in 102 countries, 11 news agencies and nine regional and world-wide press groups.
