Read 2 Me came from the merging of two organizations:
Werlin Reading Teams Foundation and Pierce County Reading Foundation.

Together we have become a program which strives to enrich lives by inspiring people to volunteer and share in the joy of reading.

Description:
Read 2 Me came from the merging of two organizations: Werlin Reading Teams Foundation and Pierce County Reading Foundation. Together we have become a program which strives to enrich lives by inspiring people to volunteer and share in the joy of reading. We advocate for and create opportunities, beginning at birth, which nurture lifelong learners in the communities we serve.

Our vision is to create a literate world. One child at a time, we work within the community with parents, caregivers, and children to promote the message of reading success, and support the school systems efforts for every child to reach benchmark reading goals by the time they enter fourth grade.

History:
ABOUT R2M.
The longest running, most successful
tutoring program in the United States,
Read 2 Me began in 1988 when a
Franciscan Hospital executive provided
fifty volunteers to help with reading
at a local elementary school.

Known as SMART as its outset, the
program emphasized tutoring/
mentoring within the Tacoma
Public Schools and changed its
name to Werlin Reading several
years later. As a result of a
merger with the Pierce County
Reading Foundation, whose focus
was on early literacy, the program
is now known as Read 2 Me.

Since its inception, Read 2 Me has helped over 8,500 children, utilizes nearly 1000 community volunteers on an annual basis and has expanded to nearly half of all elementary schools in Tacoma. Over the next twelve months, Read 2 Me will expand into schools in greater Pierce County.
EARLY LITERACY.
It is never too early to read to a child. Even infants benefit from the voices and sounds they hear during the first part of their lives. Read 2 Me believes that all children should be exposed to books at a very early age because when children listen to stories, they gain important language skills.

Reading aloud for at least twenty minutes per day with children helps them learn new words and understand written language as they begin to discover the world around them.

TUTORING / MENTORING.
It is amazing how spending just 45 minutes a week with a child can change their lives so profoundly. Yet, we hear it from parents, teachers and tutors every year. The time that Read 2 Me volunteers give these students is the little extra nudge they need to go from struggling with letters to reading books in just one school year.

For most of them, it is a chance at a better future. For all of us, it is a chance for a better world.

Contact person: General Information, (email)

Address:

1944 Pacific Ave., Ste. 306 Tacoma, WA 98402 (See a map)