Reading Mentoring Programs

Building literacy skills for young readers

Research shows that third-grade reading levels are a key predictor of children’s future success in school and in life. Children who build the literacy skills they need to read proficiently by the end of third grade are four times more likely to graduate from high school than their peers who read below grade level.

For more than 20 years, our reading mentoring programs—ReadSquad and Book Explorers—have helped young readers in grades 1-3 build the essential literacy skills that they need to make the critical transition from learning to read to reading to learn. Both programs are informed by the science of reading and employ the research-proven strategy of mentoring to improve outcomes, achieving impressive results year after year. The most recent independent evaluation of our programs showed:

• Students participating in ReadSquad, our school-based program, increased their reading skills by an average of 1.18 grade levels over the seven-month program (especially substantial given that mentees begin reading well below grade level), translating to 45% more growth than a typical student would be expected to achieve in an academic year.
• Students participating in Book Explorers, our 12-session program designed for use inside and outside of school settings, increased their reading skills by an average of 0.79 grade levels – achieving significantly more growth than expected during the average duration of the program.