AUK students launch the “#ReadToLead” campaign to promote reading books

Duhok, Kurdistan Region – August 24th, 2020 – Last week, The American University of Kurdistan’s Student Government launched a campaign on their social media platforms to promote reading books amongst students and youth. Within the scope of the #ReadtoLead campaign, students were asked to share their favorite books, give a review on their current reads, or highlight an outstanding quote from a book. Fun activities such as “Book Bingo” or “This or That” were also part of the campaign and helped raise awareness.

“The current generation of young people living in the age of digital media is losing more and more connection to books and conventional media. With #ReadToLead, we aimed to motivate students and young people to read books and other printed media which is beneficial not just for their education and future careers but also to use reading to survive the current pandemic situation and lockdowns”, said Mitra Ali Tatar, Head of AUK Student Government’s Communications Committee.

Another central part of the campaign was to promote young local authors, including AUK students, by several posts highlighting their works on AUK Student Government (@auk_sg) ‘s social media platforms. In addition to highlighting a wide range of local bookstores helped to raise interest among social media followers.

Within only one week, the campaign promoted six young local authors, ten bookstores in Duhok, more than ten book reviews, and more than one hundred books were sent to @auk_sg via the hashtag.

The present cabinet of the AUK student government is the third, and presided by Fatma Othman, AUK senior student of Business Management, that contributed significantly to student life at AUK. The Student Government falls under the purview of the Office of Student Affairs.