History
Started in 2004 at the request of the Coachella Valley Unified School District Superintendent of Schools, Roberta and Clay Klein started a fund at the Desert Community Foundation and asked the pastor of their church for his assistance in recruiting volunteers. Father Howard Lincoln of Sacred Heart Church readily agreed. The District had been using English speaking volunteers to the extent, they could get them to go into the schools in the district that had no English speaking people in the community. Roberta asked the Superintendent if he would provide buses if they could recruit volunteers who were fluent in English through churches and other organizations.
Read With Me was born and now brings volunteers from seven churches to five different schools. The schools are all in areas of high poverty with a majority of the parents untrained in academic English. They love their children but cannot help them with English.
In 2013, Read With Me received a Golden Bell Award for English Acquisition from the California School Board Association. We believe the program is totally replicable in other areas that face similar challenges in providing tutoring and mentoring for disadvantaged children in a classroom setting.
What we do
In the classroom, the teacher assigns individual volunteers to selected students to listen to them read, assisting them with pronunciation and comprehension. The mentor/tutors are typically retired part-time Coachella Valley residents, some with special skills who help specific students go beyond the basic.
Read With Me
Honored with the Golden Bell award for English Acquisition by the California School Board Association and the 2022 GuideStar Silver Seal of Transparency
Volunteer Programs
We are accepting new and returning volunteers!
Our Read with Me Coordinators will assist all volunteers in the registration process for your assigned school. Volunteers will be in-person in all schools in 2023-2024. Contact us at ReadWithMeRachel@gmail.com or at 760-567-1830 to get started!
Watch this video from our local news source, KESQ, for more information about our program:
https://youtu.be/N-goLVyG5LE
More About Us
More About Us Read With Me began in 2004 at a Mecca, CA school. Now, 18 years later, it has over 500 volunteer tutors serving 19 schools in Coachella Valley, CA, and 2 schools in Nevada. These tutors, recruited from news media and community sponsors, help more than 4,200 children in low-income, limited English-speaking environments improve their English language skills, fostering a caring environment that supports their individual development.
READ WITH ME NBC Interview
