Book Em

Reading is fundamental (rif) program- rif builds under-served and underprivileged children's literacy skills, which are essential for academic success. Elementary children select books for themselves to cherish, enjoy and build their home libraries. They are also exposed to rif volunteers as positive community role models, who help motivate them to love reading and books.during the 2023-2024 school year, book'em provided 31,000 books to approximately 6,000 economically disadvantaged elementary school students, who attended fifteen title i metro nashville public schools through our rif program. An average of 80% of these students are considered economically disadvantaged, 72% are below basic reading level, and 30% are english language learners.approximately 250 volunteers visited their assigned classrooms to read aloud and engage with the students about 5 times throughout the school year.every child received about 5 books with a total of 31,000 books distributed.

Book bus - in 2022, parnassus books donated their small book bus to book'em. We renovated and updated the bus and developed a new book bus program which launched late 2023. This provides the means to reach more youth by going to where they are and allowing them to participate in special programming and selected books through a novel venue.

Read me day celebrations- book'em held two read me day celebrations at mnps elementary schools in 2024. Several hundred community guests helped us celebrate reading at these schools with an assembly program followed by guests reading aloud and engaging with each classroom. Students got to select two books to take home as their forever books.

Ready for reading- ready for reading provides classroom reading role model volunteers for pre-k classrooms at two early learning centers in metro nashville public schools. These volunteers read aloud and engage with these 4 year olds once a week for about 30 minutes to help them get ready for kindergarten.