City of Cambridge Participatory Budgeting

Citywide

This project will fund the purchase of 300-350 bilingual books for Cambridge children in the Agenda for Children’s Literacy Initiative project who are learning English, learning to read, and have limited/no access to books in their home language.

Details: 

Cambridge is a multilingual city with more than 32% of families speaking a language other than English at home. Children of these families have limited access to bilingual books in their first languages, which include Amharic, Haitian Creole, Bengali, Punjabi, Russian, Chinese, and about 25 other languages. Having books available in parents’ native languages allows parents who are not fluent in English to read to their children in the language they speak best. Research shows that talking and reading to children in the home language helps children’s language and literacy development as they get ready for school.

Literacy Ambassadors (multi-lingual, multicultural parents) from the Cambridge Public Health Agenda for Children’s Literacy Initiative will bring the books to families participating in this early literacy program through home visits, parent workshops, and at StoryWalks and other Cambridge community events during the year.

This proposal would fund the purchase of 300-350 additional bilingual books for Cambridge children age 0-7 years who are learning English, learning to read, and have limited or no access to books in their home language.