Project Open Book brings joy of reading to patients at Children’s Memorial

When Susan Goldman pushes her red cart filled with the latest Clifford, Dora, Captain Underpants and Lizzy McGuire books down the hallways of Children's Memorial Hospital, her visit is often the high point of the day for the hospital's young patients — especially those with serious illnesses or undergoing difficult treatments.

Goldman's visits are made possible by the Project Open Book program, a joint collaboration between Children's Memorial and the Chicago chapter of the national non-profit organization Reading Is Fundamental (RIF), funded in part by Cubs Care and a $250,000 gift from the McCormick Tribune Foundation. About 12,000 new books are distributed to children at the hospital each year.

Several times a week Goldman, the Chicago-area program coordinator for RIF, visits the outpatient areas at both Children's Memorial's main campus and outpatient center at Clark and Deming Streets. She's often accompanied by volunteers from the hospital's Founders' Board and the Northwest Suburban Guild, an affiliated organization of the Children's Memorial Foundation.

The goal of Project Open Book is to encourage literacy among young children by teaching them that reading is not only important but fun. Children select their own books, which they are allowed to keep. For those undergoing complex procedures and tests, choosing their own books allows them to feel they have some control over their lives.

Although many of us take books for granted, for many of the hospital's lower-income patients and their families, they are a luxury. For some children, the books they take home are their first books and provide the beginning of a small library to share with other children.

For information about Project Open Book at Children's Memorial, please call 773.880.3273.