Small Antique town holds story-reading session

ILOILO CITY—A small town in Antique hopes to give a big boost to efforts to promote reading among Filipinos by holding a municipal-wide story-reading session on Nov. 27.

Thousands of residents of Pandan town, 124 kilometers north of the capital town of San Jose, are set to line up along an 18-km stretch of their national highway and simultaneously read an excerpt from a story at 9 a.m., said event organizer Leo Dioso.

Dioso, a retired United Nations official who donated a modern library to the municipality, said the residents would read the full text of the popular Anglican hymn “All Things Bright and Beautiful,” which would take around two minutes.

The reading session will be joined by elementary and high school students, municipal officials and employees, and other residents.

The line will stretch from the boundary of Pandan and Libertad towns to the Pandan-Sebaste border.

“We hope to dramatize the importance of education and reading especially among the younger generations,” Dioso told the INQUIRER.

The event is a joint initiative of Leocadio Alonsagay Dioso Memorial Public Library, the municipal government of Pandan led by Mayor Jonathan Dioso Tan and the Department of Education.

The activity will be held to mark the National Reading Month this November and Reading Day on Nov. 27.

On the same day, President Aquino is also scheduled to lead a reading session among schoolchildren in Manila.

Dioso said the start of the reading would be signaled by the Pandan’s community radio station, which would also lead practice reading sessions a few minutes before the event.

Vehicle traffic along the national highway in Pandan will be suspended for eight minutes during the reading session.

The town has been holding regular “readaloud” sessions involving schoolchildren at Leocadio Alonsagay Dioso Memorial Public Library since it opened in 2004.

Pandan is a third-class municipality (annual income: P25 million-P35 million) with around 34,000 residents.

But its library is among the most modern municipal public libraries in the country with a collection of more than 25,000 volumes.