The former Prime Minister of Australia, Julia Gillard on Wednesday distributed over 1,000 children story books to Rise to Shine nursery and primary school based in Masaka Sector in Kicukiro District.

According to a statement, the books are part of the Rwandan Collection of Ducere African Children’s story books which are written by children from different countries including Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Malawi.

Ducere, to which Gillard is the current Chancellor, is a global education initiative that is based in Australia.

The pupils were excited about the support towards their reading programme.

At the event, strategies for promoting and encouraging reading were shared with teachers and the school library was also bolstered with the gift of 150 storybooks from Imagine We, a local not-for-profit organisation.

After the event, Ms. Gillard, in company of Mathew Jacobson, the Ducere founder, met the CEO of Imagine We, Nicky Alonga and both parties agreed to continue working together.

Imagine We and Ducere Foundation have published the first Rwandan collection of children’s stories after a competition was hosted in primary schools around Kigali all of whom are members of the StAR Clubs (Students Actively Reading) initiated by the local NGO.

More than four hundred children were involved last year.

The goal is to increase this number in the next competition as both organisations continue to jointly mobilise more schools to take part in the programme.

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