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The Reading Toward a Better Future Program identifies a potential company that is located geographically close to a local community.   After meeting with the company’s General Manager the company is teamed up with an elementary school from that community.  The program then facilitates that company’s Human Resource department to recruit suitable volunteers and conduct preparation workshops with ongoing support and coaching fop the volunteers.  Reading Toward a Better Future coordinates the transportation logistics so that the children can be bussed to the business where they are provided with a warm lunch by the company. They are then teamed up with their personal adult role model for 30 to 40 minutes of reading and quality time.  Recommended books are purchased to enrich the school library so that they are accessible to the children for their every day routine.

The Project was initiated n 2006 to fill a need that encourages reading to young school children from lower social economic backgrounds, many of whom come from families of immigrants from Ethiopia and other countries whose parents do not speak fluent Hebrew and/or are illiterate.  Also, employees in the Israeli Business Sector were interested in being involved  in the community. This project was set up to unite and pair up volunteers from local businesses with children from local elementary schools to expose them to the enjoyment and advantages of reading as well as to provide them with an adult role model in an inspiring work environment. 

Our primary mission is to enable young children at risk from social economic backgrounds to achieve the important literacy skills and teach them the enjoyment of reading books.  In addition, we strive to:.

      Expose young school children to key Social/Jewish values by connecting them with adult role models.

      Expose these children to the positive experience of stories by discussing the content and moral messages from the stories further enabling them to develop their imagination, enhance their vocabulary and show them the advantages of literacy and intellectual capabilities as a tool to achieving success

      Reduce the growing social gap by providing equal opportunities to all Jewish Children of school age in Israel.

The organization has been completely volunteer run for years. Funding would provide a modest salary for the director and an additional staff person to expand on the needs of the organization making it more successful. 

We utilize the available (free) resources and the need of employees from the Business Sector to be involved in their community to provide local underprivileged children with a basic skill that they do not get from their home environment  or from the  education system that does not have resources for such a program.

The program puts very few demands on the volunteers, as the children are brought to the business facility therefore saving the volunteer and the company valuable time.

It also exposes the children to the possibilities that are open to them if they acquire literacy skills.

We enable and empower both the local Business community and the local Elementary schools by providing them with a sense of success as well as the invaluable feeling of accomplishment and self fulfillment by all participants in the program  (both the children as well as the volunteers) as their relationship deepens and they learn not only from the books they read but also from each other.

Flying Cargo International Transportation Ltd.

February 28, 2008

To Whom it may concern,

This is the second consecutive year that our Company is involved in the reading project for children of grade 3 and 4, from the Levi Eskol School in the city of Lod. Anat Rothschild of "Reading Towards a Better Future" organization suggested the program to us, which we lovingly adopted.

Once a week, at the end of school hours, fifteen children arrive at our offices, where they receive a warm meal and proceed to meet with their personal tutor, a volunteer from our organization who meets with the same child every week.

The tutors and the children spend quality time together, an hour where the children receive the full focused attention for reading together from books that were purchased for this purpose and that their content suits their age level.

During the reading session, the child and the tutor decide on the best ways that suits both of them to proceed.  There are volunteers that read to the children and there are children that choose to read by themselves and others who do both.

When a child finishes a book he will write a recommendation so that the others can choose a book based on the feedback of their peers.  The recommendations are kept in a special folder in the reading area.

Special bonds are forged between the children and the volunteers, where books and the topics in them are discussed which mirror the topics that interest the children who do not always have someone in their lives to share these thoughts and experiences with.  Some of them even stay in touch in the time between the official meetings.

I have followed the project from its beginning, and feel that it contributes and enriches the children's world.  The children receive a full hour of personal attention and the adults who volunteers earn a sense of fulfillment.

I am happy that the organization that employs me, believes in the objective of the program and enables this very important project to be carried out.

Sincerely,

Matti Gado

a.    Organize an event to raise funding for this organization.

b.    Purchase your favorite childhood books for the reading center.

c.    “Adopt” one of the projects and in this way put a place, name and even face to the children who will benefit from this support.

d.     Visit and/or volunteer

e.    Pen-pal, email, chat, and/or connect via JChoice.org