[LM_NET] HIT: Heifer International's Read to Feed

[Gundry Rowe <growe1979@YAHOO.COM>]

Original request:
  I am the librarian at a Title I school.  We are interested in 
participating in Heifer International's Read to Feed program 
(http://www.readtofeed.com/).  I have searched the archives and found 
some information about this program, but am interested in additional 
info.  (I did see one request for information that was made in the past 
year, but did not see a HIT.)
   
  I'm particularly interested in hearing about:
  - how schools tallied their information - by time, pages read, books 
read etc.
  - any problems or glitches that you encountered
   
  I would also really like to hear from anyone who used corporate 
sponsors to support this program rather than having students find individual 
sponsors.  Any information that you can provide about how this worked 
would be very helpful.  

   
  These are the responses I got:

Hi - I am a 4th grade classroom teacher switching to

the library next year, but I've had my class

participate in "Read to Feed" for the past 3 years. 

It is a wonderful organization to work with, and the

students benfit so much from both the reading and

knowing that they are making an impact on their world.

 I've only ever had students recieve individual

pledges for the number of books read, so I have no

info. on corporate sponsors for you, but I just wanted

to recommend the program. I can't say enough positive

things about it.
   
   

I implemented the program at our school last year and it was a huge 

success!  Unfortunately due to some scheduling glitches, I was unable to 

schedule it this year, but we are aiming for fall of next year for our 

2nd Annual “Read to Feed” Marathon.  The materials that were 

provided by Read to Feed were wonderful and included a video, a children’s 

book, parent letters, flyers, brochures, collection envelopes, and 

stickers.  Ours is a small, specialized school with 125 students K-12 who 

are deaf/hard of hearing or blind/visually impaired.  We had 56 students 

participate and they read over 7,000 pages during one 4 hour reading 

marathon and raised $1500!  We organized our program as a reading 

marathon by dividing the kids into reading teams of 4-5 students.  During the 

4 hour reading marathon, the members of each team rotated into the 

library for 30 minutes reading sessions, documenting the number of pages 

read during each of their reading sessions.  The Reading Marathon 

occurred in the evening and staff volunteers monitored the readers and helped 

manage the transition of students in and out every 30 minutes.  Our 

cafeteria and staff volunteers also provided refreshments for us.  Prior 

to the reading marathon, the students solicited money from sponsors at 

home and on campus as “cents per page” donations for the team page 

total (like 10¢/page), but most people gave $5-10 cash donations..  I 

kept track of the total money each team earned on an Excel spreadsheet.  

After the marathon, the teams met and “spent” the money their team 

earned by choosing the animals they wanted to donate to Heifer.  I 

created a PowerPoint presentation of photos taken during the marathon and 

highlighting each team’s total pages read, money earned, and animals 

purchased.  Prized were awarded to the top 3 highest earning teams and 

the top 2 students who solicited the most in donations as well as for 

the top 2 teams with the highest total pages read.  The students were SO 

proud and it really was quite an accomplishment for our students, our 

deaf students in particular, as reading is difficult for them and they 

typically read well below grade level.  Our blind students chose to read 

in 1 hour sessions and one of our Braille readers said, at the end of 

her second hour, “I’ve read til my fingers are numb!”.  Anyway, a 

GREAT program which really helped our students see needs beyond their 

own.  I would highly recommend this program for any school!  The “Read 

to Feed” website has lots of resources – a curriculum guide, story 

book recommendations, activities, etc.  I hope you decide to give it a 

try.  It all went pretty smoothly, although the money collection was a 

bit of a pain.  But part of that is our particular situation.  About 

60% of our students are residential and go home each weekend.  So 

allowing the time (2-3 Fridays) to get envelopes sent home initially to 

solicit donations (and getting them returned!) and then sending the envelopes 

out again to collect the money (and getting them returned) was a bit of 

a hassle.  It was very time consuming for me, but I organized & 

implemented it alone.  It would work better to have a committee undertake this 

project.  Of course, you can organize it any way you like – I used 

the evening reading marathon idea.  I think the website gives ideas on 

the ways other schools have implemented it.  Good luck! 

 

I'd be interested in seeing a hit of your responses.  I bet I could get 

some new ideas.
   
   
   

We just did it by books read. The kids each had an envelope to collect 

the sponsor's names and per book amount. We raised over $1000 with 

little effort. I am in a 1st-3rd grade school with 600 students in southern 
  New Jersey.
   
   
   
  Thanks to all who responded - 
  Gundry Rowe
Gaithersburg Elementary School 
Gaithersburg, MD
growe1979@yahoo.com



                
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