Mission

Read to Me Project (RtMP) helps under-served children achieve kindergarten readiness and a lifetime of literacy by empowering school age brothers and sisters to read to their young siblings at home. We also raise public awareness about the literacy crisis and the need for language development and pre-reading skills during a child's first five years of life.

The Big Idea

At least 85% of brain development occurs before the age of five. Children who hear more words before this age form the foundational skills required to be successful in school. RtMP works to ensure that low-literacy families have access to this information, as well as the skills and resources to leverage it.

RtMP coaches 4th-6th grade students in underperforming schools on the best ways to read to young children and provides books for them to practice these skills with their younger siblings at home. By encouraging students to regularly read to their preschool-aged siblings, the little ones develop crucial pre-literacy skills and a love for reading, while the older students improve their own reading fluency.

RtMP takes a comprehensive approach to ensuring that every child enters kindergarten prepared to succeed by offering classes to parents and teen parents, teaching them how to activate their role as their child’s first teacher.

The Read to Me Project helped my students become leaders for their young relatives, inspiring a love of learning at all ages.

- Cris M.