Our New SitStayRead All Stars!

We're thrilled to announce that the 2011 batch of SitStayRead bookmarks has arrived featuring five new furry faces!

From left to right, we have Jack (winner of the silent auction bookmark package), Charlie & Emma (Dogs of the Year!), Bandit (seasoned SitStayRead Dog), and Feste (winner of the online auction bookmark package.)

Click here to find out more about these super star dogs! Give a big round of a-paws to these adorable pups!

Email from a Principal

That's Shandy with Evion, a young reader at Hendricks Academy, back in 2004. I can still remember how earnest Evion was when reading aloud. He'd be all smiles though when it came time to have Shandy do a trick.

Hendricks was our very first SitStayRead school and it is such a treat for the volunteers and dogs to return there each year. So you can imagine how thrilled we were to get this email from Principal Perisin.

"Here at Hendricks we are working to ensure that our students will have a world class education and you are helping me to fulfill that goal. Next year there will be some changes and we hope that you will still be working with us. You have been an anchor for our literacy program and we want you to continue the work."

Thank you Principal Perisin for your kind words--you can count on us to continue making reading fun for the fabulous students at Hendricks!

Welcome To Our New SitStayRead Dogs!

Today was an exciting day at the office! Two dogs passed the Dog Team Test to become part of our programs. Congratulations Smokey and Sofia!

Dannielle (on the right) is the proud handler of gorgeous Labradoodle, Sofia. You won't want to miss the new dog-themed wine that Dannielle, of Old Shore Vineyards, will be unveiling in the next few weeks to honor Sofia and benefit SitStayRead. Look for more details to come!

And no doubt you recognize our Admin Asst Amy and our office pup, the adorable Smokey.

Look for these great new teams in programs soon!

A Greater Good For Reading!

We are excited to share that GreaterGood.org has awarded a generous grant to SitStayRead! The prestigious London-based The Economist Group chose GreaterGood.org to fund an education project in the United States, and GreaterGood.org chose SitStayRead as the recipient. Yeah!! The grant of $11,800 funds an entire class of second-graders for the full school year!

We are honored to be affiliated with GreaterGood.org. Click here to check out the work they make possible through The Literacy Site website and be sure to click every day to help us reach more kids in need!

Here's what Lisa Halstead, board president of GreaterGood.org, had to say:

"We're very grateful to The Economist Group for providing the funding to enable us to support an entire year's worth of sessions for one school's second grade. And we are equally impressed with the quality of the program provided by SitStayRead. Through their innovative use of dogs and their dedicated volunteers, they have made an amazing impact on the lives of the children that they serve."

Click here or on the photo above to see the video that accompanied the grant announcement. The furry stars in this video include our very own SitStayRead dogs: Wrigley, Tojo, Spinny, Laverne, Lola, and Charley!

An Email from a Program Leader

Jess Biscamp, one of our fabulous SitStayRead program leaders, made our day with this email to her team of volunteers in Ms. Pierre's class at Sumner Academy. We are so lucky to get to work with such great kids, teachers, and volunteers.

Hello, Sumner volunteers,

I didn't want to wait until next week to share Mrs. Pierre's good news and thanks with you. She pulled me aside during the program today and let me know that since we started coming, her students have been asking her if they can take home three and four books to read on the weekends. She said this is a big change in how much enthusiasm they have toward reading.

She also showed me the improvement in some of their reading fluency scores (i.e., DIBELS testing). Many of the students started the year in the 45-70 words-per-minute range and have now reached 90-120 words-per-minute! They are considered at grade level if they reach 90-words-per-minute at the beginning of third grade, and many of the students have already surpassed that in second grade. I cannot begin to express to you just how thankful Mrs. Pierre is for all the time and effort you are putting into helping her students improve their reading and writing; she said that the added excitement of new people and dogs has really pushed the students to do their absolute best. She was positively joyous while telling me about it!

Thank you all for the effort and time you put in to help these students. You are making a huge difference in their lives.

Happy Reading!

Jess Biscamp

Reading Fun at NUSH!

Our newest after-school programs at Northwestern University Settlement House (NUSH) just finished-up and the response from the kids, volunteers, and NUSH partners (thank you Mr. Jesse!) was overwhelmingly positive!

The NUSH e-newsletter included a slideshow of the fun--that's Spinney and Sandy with a young reader. To see a slideshow of more photos, click here.

Many thanks to our friends at Bears Care for bringing SitStayRead and NUSH together to help students read! We look forward to returning in spring for another session.

Dogs for da Bears!

Bears fans all across Chicago are excited about today's big game and that includes our dogs! Sure, they're loyal to the hometown team but our dogs also know that Bears Care is a BIG supporter of kids in Chicago and especially SitStayRead.

Check-out these photos of the Bears with SitStayRead through the years and then email us (info@sitstayread.org) photos showing how your dogs show their Bears team spirit. We'll add them to the album for all to see. (Click on photo for larger version.)

GO BEARS!!