Reading to Kids News

June 30, 2002  

Thanks to the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation

This week, we received the good news that the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation has awarded Reading to Kids a $15,000 grant!

Earlier this month, Mr. Mark Eiduson of the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation and his wife Jane visited the June reading clubs at Gratts Elementary School. We are always very excited to give visitors a tour of our program, and on this occasion, Mr. and Mrs. Eiduson were able to attend the "new volunteer" training session, the parent training seminar, and several of the reading sessions. We are greatly appreciative of the time they spent observing the program.

The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation helps its grantees serve the communities of Southern California with focused and responsive grantmaking in the areas of social impact, civic and cultural, higher education and health. Their grant, along with the generous donations from many foundations, corporations, organizations, and individuals will greatly help in our mission to promote improved reading and learning skills in elementary school children--skills that may help lead to a more successful future for the children who participate.

Thanks to the Whitecap Foundation

On June 13, Ms. Wendy Chang of the Whitecap Foundation notified us that Reading to Kids had just been awarded an $11,000 grant!

We are extremely delighted to be collaborating with the Whitecap Foundation to instill a love of reading in Los Angeles children. Many students living near downtown Los Angeles reside in a densely populated area with numerous apartment and commercial buildings and little or no access to safe recreational areas. Many of the children in this area are from low income families, are recent immigrants to the country, are limited-English proficient, and have room for substantial improvement in their reading test scores. Helping these students is our highest priority.

The generous monetary gifts of our supporters help us to promote reading and learning skills in elementary school children, develop the library resources of participating schools, furnish bokks for childrens' homes, provide enriching and rewarding volunteering opportunities, and work towards the expansion of the successful "Reading Club" program to more elementary schools. To learn how to make a donation, please click here!

Disney and First Book Partner Up to Donate 1,000 Books to Reading to Kids

First Book, the nonprofit that recently donated over 600 books to Reading to Kids, will be partnering with Disney to further their mission of giving children from low-income families the opportunity to read and own their first new books.

Disney will be donating one million books to First Book, and 9,000 of those will go to Los Angeles nonprofits. 1,000 of those will go to Reading to Kids! Thank you First Book and Disney!

Thanks to June Reading Club Participants

June was another successful month for the reading club program. 126 volunteers read to 277 children at Gratts Elementary and Magnolia Elementary Schools on Saturday, June 8. The theme of the month was "Animals," and children were read a variety of books featuring animal characters, including the 2001 Caldecott Honor Book, Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin, and the enormously popular Rainbow Fish to the Rescue! by Swiss author Marcus Pfister.