‘Read by 3’ program extended by grant

The Bartholomew Consolidated School Foundation has announced the continuation of the “Read by 3” program. Ethan Crough, BCSF Executive Director, says the continuation of the program was made possible through a $5,000 donation from the Duke Energy Foundation.

Crough says that the Read by 3 program is modeled after a pilot launched in the 2011-2012 schools year in five Indianapolis Public Schools by the M.A. Rooney Foundation. It consists of systematic and explicit, multi-sensory teaching for phonics instruction. He says that the teaching methodology is based on extensive research and has shown great success in the IPS system.

Crough says that the impetus for launching the pilot in Columbus came from a parent created grassroots organization called R.E.A.D.S., (Recognizing Educating and Advocating for Dyslexic Students) who helped highlight the need to help dyslexic children in the community.

In BCSC schools during the 2014-2015 school year, the pilot year of the program, 89 percent of the 140 participating kindergartners were reading at grade level by the end of the school year, compared to the 81 percent of kindergartners at the identified schools reading at grade level by the end of the 2013-2014 school year, said Crough.

The BCSF says that the program was implemented at the start of the 2014-2015 school year and was piloted in six kindergarten classrooms at Taylorsville Elementary and Columbus Signature Academy-Lincoln Campus. For the 2015-2016 school year, the program expanded to include first grade classrooms at Taylorsville Elementary. Crough says that a dedicated full-time coach administers the program and works with teachers at each of the schools.