Quote:
Originally Posted by EricH
There are better ways to do that, however.
What exactly they are may depend largely on the area around the library and what the target audience likes to do, but I would suspect that it's quite possible to find something that would attract boys in large numbers without disenfranchising girls. For example: How many kids do YOU know that would pass up a chance to earn some money by doing something that doesn't take a lot of work? Like, oh, I don't know, reading a book? An announcement that the library (or a sponsor) was offering some (reasonable) amount of money per some (reasonable) amount of books read (subject to certain possible restrictions, let's just say age-appropriate for now) would almost certainly trigger some sort of response. And if you were particularly sneaky, you put in bonuses for who reads the most.
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The key word there is
sneaky. If you host that kind of event it would get people reading for the duration of the event...however there is nothing stopping the participants from staying away from the library afterword. This library wanted to get people genuinely interested in reading by hosting an event designed to attract boys, they just underestimated the outrage that that kind of discrimination causes among some people.