TEMPE, Ariz. – Arizona Cardinals defensive tackle Corey Peters has figured out a way to continue giving back to the community during the coronavirus pandemic.
Peters started The Corey Peters Playbook, a weekly virtual book club for Arizona high school students. It’s the continuation of an idea he had last fall.
Every other Tuesday, the Cardinals’ off day, Peters had hosted a book club at South Pointe High School in Phoenix. It continued through the early portion of the offseason but was cut short when schools in Arizona closed because of the coronavirus. By moving the book club to a virtual setting on Zoom, Peters hopes he can reach a broader audience of students.
One of Peters’ goals is to help kids read books that they can enjoy and that they can take something from. He picked “Marcelo in the Real World” for the next book. It’s about a 17-year-old who has Asperger’s syndrome who interns in the mailroom of his father’s law firm to learn about working in the real world.
.@CoreyPeters91 has created a virtual book club – The Corey Peters Playbook – which hopes to provide an educational outlet for all Arizona high school students during the COVID-19 crisis.
For more information on how to register for The Corey Peters Playbook ⤵️
— Arizona Cardinals (@AZCardinals) May 14, 2020
Peters, who started his Peters Education Enrichment Project in 2012, said on a conference call with reporters Friday that his role in the book club is to facilitate a healthy and safe learning environment where students can feel comfortable sharing their opinions and their peers aren’t abusive or stepping on their beliefs. Peters hopes to share the tolerance he’s learned from his years in locker rooms where people come have many different backgrounds and beliefs.
“Honestly, I get a lot out of it as well,” Peters said. “I’m always so impressed with the kids and their points of view, what they get out of it and the way they phrase things.”
Reading was always a part of Peters’ childhood. His parents made him read for 30 minutes to an hour a day, he said. One of his earliest recollections of reading was the “Goosebumps” series. He’s picked up reading more now that he’s an adult and traveling, he added. It’s given his imagination an opportunity to flourish.
In college, Peters saw firsthand how reading can impact a person.
Some of his teammates at the University of Kentucky were not comfortable in classroom settings or talking in front of large groups because they weren’t confident in their ability to read, he said.
“I just think that reading is an important thing,” he said. “It’s an easy thing. Everybody has access to some information with the internet, and if you’re able to read, you’re able to teach yourself anything. I truly believe that.”