As our community continues to face a tight economy and shrinking budgets, the Daily Record has established this feature that each week reports the efforts of local nonprofit organizations and the individuals and businesses that support them.
Bailey Publishing & Communications invites all members of the local nonprofit community to email news, announcements and success stories to: [email protected].
We also encourage our readers to become more aware of the needs of these worthy organizations as they continue to provide valuable services with reduced resources.
Grant to benefit early literacy program
United Way of Northeast Florida and its “Women In Local Leadership” are among 10 United Ways in Florida selected to benefit from a $1 million annual grant from Carol and Barney Barnett to implement “ReadingPals,” an early literacy initiative designed to increase the number of students in Northeast Florida reading at grade level by the end of the third grade.
United Way of Northeast Florida’s portion of the grant will total $300,000 with Women In Local Leadership members recruiting, training and placing more than 1,000 ReadingPals over the three years of the grant.
The ReadingPals initiative is focused on engaging, training and deploying volunteer readers in schools with kindergarten readiness rates of less than 85 percent.
The first year goal includes more than 300 volunteers serving 30 programs across Northeast Florida in Duval County Public Schools Voluntary Pre-K programs, United Way-certified “Success By 6” early learning centers and certified Guiding Stars early learning centers to help children become “reading ready” before they enter school.
Thirty percent of Duval County children are not ready to start kindergarten, according to United Way.
Early literacy through efforts like ReadingPals includes modeling the use of rich language and expressing ideas in complete sentences to help children understand the meaning of words and relate learning to new activities.
Volunteer teams will commit to reading to students twice a week beginning in October for the 2012-13 school year.
“If a child starts school already behind their peers, it’s a much tougher task to get up to speed,” said Connie Hodges, president of United Way of Northeast Florida.
“This initiative provides reading volunteers who can instill the love of reading in a child that helps them be ready to learn when they enter the first grade,” she said.
“Research shows that reading, the single most important skill for learning, is the building block for a lifetime of academic success, improving students’ on-time grade promotion and increasing high school graduation rates. This benefits the entire community,” she said.
United Way’s community partners in the project include The Children’s Movement, Duval County Public Schools, Early Learning Coalition of Duval, Jacksonville Children’s Commission, Jacksonville Public Library and Success By 6 centers in Northeast Florida.
“Through the third grade, children are learning to read and mastering language and comprehension skills to become successful readers,” said Melissa Adams, Women In Local Leadership co-chair and senior system analyst with Winn-Dixie Stores Inc.
“After the third grade, they are reading to learn. Volunteers, giving the extra individual attention a child may need, make the difference in whether our children and schools succeed,” she said.
“Ensuring that our students read well beyond the third-grade level standard is critical to increasing high school graduation rates, and we all have a stake in that,” she said.
The mission of Women In Local Leadership is to engage local women leaders in addressing social issues by contributing their time, talent and financial support to achieve positive, lasting change in Northeast Florida.
Members have chosen early learning as their primary focus issue through their volunteer leadership and oversight of United Way’s Born Learning and Success By 6 initiatives.
Volunteer readers will receive training and will be matched with pre-kindergarten children at risk of falling behind.
More than 300 volunteers are needed annually through 2015. To learn how to become a ReadingPal or for more information on the importance of early literacy, visit uwnefl.org/readingpals or call United Way of Northeast Florida at 390-3200.
Sheriff Rutherford to lead charity bike ride
The “Celebrate America Ride for Justice” is scheduled June 30 to benefit the Justice Coalition. The ride will begin and end at Adamec Harley-Davidson at 8909 Baymeadows Road.
For the seventh year, riders will be led on a 50-mile scenic route across Jacksonville’s bridges and roads. Jacksonville Sheriff John Rutherford will lead the way.
After the ride, participants will be served a lunch of hot dogs, hamburgers and apple pie.
Registration is $30 per biker and $15 per passenger, which includes a T-shirt and lunch. Riders can receive $5 off their ticket purchase if they buy early.
The event is limited to 750 riders. All proceeds will benefit the Justice Coalition.
Participants can register by calling the Justice Coalition at 783-6312 or online at justicecoalition.org. Tickets also are available at all Adamec Harley-Davidson locations.
Walmart awards grant for summer learning
The Walmart Foundation awarded a District Summer Learning Initiative grant of $750,000 over two years to Duval County Public Schools to serve 800 youth in the 2012 Superintendent’s Summer Academy Programs.
At a time when school districts around the country are curtailing summer learning programs in response to budget cuts, the National Summer Learning Association received a $4 million grant from the Walmart Foundation to provide more than 7,000 summer learning opportunities for middle school students.
The free programs will help students avoid summer learning loss and return to the classroom ready to learn in the fall.
All students in Duval County Title I middle schools who are bridging grades five to six are eligible to attend the program. Students in the five Title I Turnaround middle schools bridging grades eight to nine are also eligible to attend.
“Duval County has designed its Superintendent’s Academy to accelerate student achievement in reading, mathematics and science with the specific aim of producing more graduates ready for college and career,” said Gary Huggins, CEO of the National Summer Learning Association.
Duval County Public Schools will provide meals to students who often have difficulty accessing federally funded meals during the summer.
The Food Research and Action Center announced that six of seven children eligible for such meals during the school year did not receive similar meals during summer 2011.
The grant continues the Walmart Foundation’s support for the learning association and summer learning for middle school youth.
Walmart’s 2012 Summer Giving program is part of an ongoing, multiyear effort to support the health and development of children.
To date, Walmart’s efforts have affected nearly 150,000 children, providing summer learning, summer meals and summer jobs.