LeVar Burton Launches Kickstarter Campaign to Revive Reading Rainbow

As a child, I was fortunate to have a passion for reading instilled in me by two sources: my bookworm mother and LeVar Burton.

Burton - who portrayed Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge on Star Trek: The Next Generation - hosted PBS’ Reading Rainbow for 23 years, reaching out to young TV viewers and getting them excited about reading and the power of the imagination. Now, Burton wants to once again bring the books and the fun where the kids are – the internet.

Burton has launched a campaign on crowdfunding site Kickstarter to revive Reading Rainbow  and deliver educational content to children via computers and mobile devices. Better still, he wants to make Reading Rainbow content specifically designed for use in classrooms, including supplemental learning material, and to offer this service free of charge to schools in need by subsidizing the cost.

The campaign, which seeks to raise $1 million in private donations, has been active for one day, and at the time of this post, had already raised close to $500,000.

Check out the hilarious and moving campaign video above(stick around for the ending – trust me), then visit the Kickstarter page for details on how to help and the awesome prizes being offered to those who donate. Personally, I’m most excited by the package that includes a personalized live story reading by Burton himself! But regardless of prizes, anyone whose life or whose children’s lives were touched by the Reading Rainbow program knows what a great gift this content would be to today’s children. We can help make this happen!