A Success Story

Last year, Ja, a first grader, was very excited about coming to school and learning to read. As the year progressed, she had a difficult time reading and she started dreading coming to school each day. Her teacher realized that she needed special help, and she referred her to the YMCA READS! program.

Twice a week, she worked at her own pace, first learning sounds and words, and then beginning to read whole books. With encouragement from her mentor and careful skill-building, she began to develop a love of reading, and she started taking books home for extra practice.

This individual attention really made a difference: by the end of the school year, her name was on the Honor Roll, and Ja was reading as well as the other children in her class. She was ready to go to second grade in the fall.