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Funder Focus: Heather Reisman and the Indigo Love of Reading Foundation
By Elisa Birnbaum
February 4, 2008
This month in our Funder Focus we feature the Indigo Love of Reading Foundation. Dedicated to the promotion of literacy in Canada, the foundation launched in 2004 in response to one small school in Toronto struggling to bring books to their shelves and reading into their students’ lives. CharityVillage spoke with Indigo founder and CEO, Heather Reisman, about what inspired her to start the foundation, the state of literacy in Canada today, and her attempts to make a difference.
CharityVillage: Promoting literacy is a goal that seems to fit well with your company’s overall mission. Can you briefly describe the inspiration that launched the foundation?
Heather Reisman: I was introduced to the principal of the Church Street Public School in Toronto with the expectation that we would provide a little bit of help to her. I was so taken by the paucity of books in the room, on the one hand and, on the other, by this inspirational principal and what she was trying to do with how little she had. She was so inspiring that it inspired me, and by extension Indigo, to get engaged in the process.
CV: On your website you refer to the literary crisis in Canada. How would you define the current state of literacy in Canadian schools today?
HR: It’s unbelievable. You have 42% of adult Canadians who are not functionally literate, which means they would have trouble reading a newspaper really effectively; they would have trouble preparing a resume effectively; they would have trouble with an in-depth question and answer if they were applying for a job. It’s that degree of illiteracy. And it’s a combination of the absence of education they had at various points in their life and, of course, the earlier generations of people who were severely dyslexic before people understood what that was and a lot of them were bounced out of school in grade six, seven, or eight because of that. So you have that on the adult side. Then you have grade three or grade six kids being tested and not passing basic literacy. And you have people reaching college and still not being able to effectively communicate in the written word as a result of limited reading skills. So it’s significant.
CV: Can you explain the potential impact of illiteracy on Canadian society long-term?
HR: The crisis is at all levels. When you realize that 80% of people in prison are functionally or fully illiterate, it’s the strongest correlation between crime and economic underperformance. The biggest impact it has is on the economy. When you have 42% who are functionally illiterate, that translates directly into more crime, higher use of the medical system, and just the absence of output - if you compare the output of a functionally literate person with a fully literate person. Toronto Dominion Bank did a major study and found that if we can raise the literacy level overall in the country by 1% you can add over $18 billion annually to the economy.
CV: Choosing grantees must be an extremely difficult process. Can they apply from all across the country? How many are chosen a year? What do you look for in a grantee?
HR: Yes, we select at least one grantee from every province. This year the grant application deadline is February 14th.
Up until this year, we were choosing 11, with one school - our test school - being funded continually. This year we will increase that to 15 grantees a year and we’ve also extended our principal base and our educator base on the assessment. So we’ve got a 10 panel group.
The number one thing we’re looking for is what the principal has personally demonstrated as their investment in creating programs in the school. And that is key because, of course, if we had unlimited money and all the schools can have some, that would be great. But since we only can help so many, we’re trying to get the principals who already show that they’ve done something even with their limited resources.
Then, of course, they have to show need, that they are not in an area where they have been able to raise money in other ways. The third thing is the creativity in the application. In other words, what they intend to do with the money once they get it.
CV: How does the foundation raise its funds? Since its inception, how much money has the foundation been able to raise?
HR: The majority of the funds come from Indigo profits, meaning, when particular products are bought, the profits from those products go into the fund. And consumers know when they buy these products where the profit is going. Then, about a third of the money comes straight from donations - online and in store.
We commit a million and a half [dollars] each year, but when the program’s in full gear - because it’s a three-year program - we have, in total, $4.5 million. So, this year, we are going to have to fund $4.5 million.
CV: Do you establish any partnerships with other organizations or people? And how do associations relate to the foundation’s goal and short-term strategy?
HR: We don’t have any yet but we are actually exploring a couple of partnerships. The goal of the foundation is to raise awareness in the country and then, by extension, with our provincial premiers, so that they are critically aware of how valuable it is to make it possible to have real development of literacy at the public school level.
We’d basically like to put ourselves out of business. As soon as every province agrees to start funding libraries and librarians as they did in the 60s and 70s, we will find another thing for our foundation to do. That’s our goal. In the seventies and before, schools typically got the equivalent of three new books per kid in the class. So if they had 200 kids, they would get 600 new books for their library. And, the majority had full-time librarians. Now, only 10% have full-time librarians and they get less than a third of a book per child.
Our short-term strategy is two-fold: to fund as many schools as we can and increase the database of metric information that demonstrates the correlation between the ability of kids to do well in school and reading. And the other is to raise the awareness level so that it’s high enough among the general citizens and, by extension, the premiers. This year, we were successful in getting the premier of Ontario, who had already committed to education, to say, ‘alright we are making the funding of libraries a priority for this administration’. And I will be meeting with senior politicians in BC who’ve also already expressed an interest.
CV: Are there any challenges associated with being a corporate funder?
HR: As soon as people are aware of what we’re trying to do, there is never a problem. We are only out for small donations, although we’ve had incredible things happen. For instance, we’ve had someone win an award of $25,000 and donate it to the foundation. So we’ve had some people do some extraordinary things. But basically we collect through Indigo profits or small donations that come into the foundation. Of course, anyone who donates over $20 gets a tax receipt - we are a foundation that can give tax receipts.
CV: How do you see corporate social responsibility evolving within your own company and in the corporate sector in general? How has CSR impacted your employees?
HR: I can’t speak for other corporations, but what I can tell you is that this entire program was conceived and advanced by everyone on the executive team at Indigo. I would say it’s in the heart and souls of this team. I’m very proud of this team; it’s a certain kind of people who care passionately about giving back.
What we have found, though, is that employees respond brilliantly to the opportunity to give back. Something I learned accidentally through this program is that, for many employees, their opportunity to really make a difference is limited. I mean, they are working hard every day, have families to care for etc. But, by engaging them actively - everybody at Indigo is involved in this program; it’s at the store level that we bring it to life - it has been the most energizing process. People want to give back, that is what I’ve learned; they want to make a difference. And if a company can, in whatever way, provide an opportunity, then it just lifts everyone’s spirits.
This program exists because of the employees at Indigo. Everybody is involved, they all know it, talk about it, care about it. They even sometimes work in the schools. They are intimately involved in the program.
CV: What are your hopes for the foundation as it moves forward? How do they align with your perspective on impacting change?
The strategy is to work with the schools, to fund as many as we can, and to learn as much about this [as possible]. But the goal is to get every single premier committed because together they can transform the future of Canada.
This is one of those things where you can see how easy it is to make a difference. We’re not talking about billions. If in the entire country a billion more dollars, even half a billion, was committed per year to librarians and reading materials for kids, we can transform the quality of life. So, in the scheme of how much money gets spent, $500 million is nothing and yet a huge impact.
It’s also a part of the new paradigm. The new paradigm is about understanding how to do things at the beginning, fixing things at the beginning as opposed to at the end. So, deal with the young children and make sure they’re hugely literate; don’t deal with it when they are committing crimes. And understand that things have a whole life cycle. So, as goes your investment in the early stage of our children, so goes the quality of economy over time. That’s a good example of the new paradigm. Instead of being penny wise and pound foolish, be pound wise.
What grew out of a passion for books and music and the desire to create a booklover's cultural department store has led Heather Reisman to establish Canada’s largest book retailer. With extensive business and management experience and a vision as limitless as the selection of books on Indigo shelves, it is no surprise that Reisman’s foundation is making inroads, returning literacy to the classrooms and onto the political agenda.
Elisa Birnbaum is a freelance journalist, producer and communications consultant living in Toronto. She can be reached at: esbirnbaum@gmail.com.
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