Improving Childhood Literacy

There are 16 million children living in poverty in the United States. While parents often try to provide a better life for their children, many are unable to read to them. Recognizing the importance of childhood literacy, IPM set out to help.

“By putting books into the hands of children in these families, we open up unlimited possibilities and begin to chip away at the socioeconomic imbalance in society,” says Mike O’Neill, a Boston-based project management consultant and the leader of the third-quarter 2018 Integrated Project Mercy volunteer effort. “Enabling children to pursue a better education is key to ending poverty and allowing everyone to live the dream.”

Boston’s team volunteered at the Catholic Charities Laboure Society Center to wash windows, make a blackboard, assemble bookcases, sort books, and paint reading-themed murals and footstools. The group also spent time with the children, helping them write their own books.

A group from the New Jersey office volunteered with Reading Partners NYC, which provides tutoring for primary school students struggling to read. The team headed down to PS194 in Harlem, where they worked one-on-one with the kids on reading, pronunciation, and comprehension.

IPM’s San Francisco team volunteered at early-learning advocate Tandem Partners in Early Learning, adapting books for children with special needs into colorful blocks depicting the characters to help them learn storytelling and communication skills. The IPMers learned the importance of tailored teaching experiences.

Working with Reading in Motion, the IPM family in Chicago provided 70 backpacks and books to students at the city’s Wendell Smith Elementary School. Volunteers hosted a pizza party, spent one-on-one time with the kids by reading to them, and distributed the backpacks. A second volunteer event supported the Open Books literacy program; there, IPMers worked with high school students on creative writing assignments.

In St. Louis, IPMers assembled wooden Book Boxes for 26 kindergartners and helped the kids each select five new books to start an at-home library. Bring Me a Book encourages children to read with their families. The team provided inspiration by reading to the kids during their visit.

Hosting a booth at the United Way’s Fall into Literacy Festival, volunteers from the Los Angeles office hosted a contest challenging kids and their families to build the tallest structure using 20 strands of spaghetti, mini marshmallows, tape, and string. “We had some very creative participants,” one IPM volunteer noted. “I think we have identified some future architects, engineers, and IPMers.”