A group of third-graders read stories recently about Africa, American Indians, harvesting bananas and putting on plays in Mesquite Elementary's library.
Sitting next to them were IBM employees who have guided them through eight months of reading practically every book in the library in an effort to improve their reading proficiency and prepare them for their first AIMS test.
This is the Reading Heroes group. "Heroes" is used to describe the adults and students.
"She has helped me read more and more," said student Jiana Anderson of her reading partner, Wendy West. "I have confidence."
Susan Dimka, a software development manager at IBM, has been amazed at student Elizabeth Gessling's improvement since September.
"She started out as a ho-hum reader," Dimka said, "and now, she acts out the characters with so much energy."
People are also reading…
The Reading Heroes program started four years ago as an offshoot of a national literacy program called Learning for Life. Connie Erickson, Mesquite's principal at the time, contacted Kathy Carlisle, IBM's corporate community relations manager, asking for reading volunteers.
"It looked like a perfect program, and a very flexible program for our volunteers to get interested in," Carlisle said.
This year, 21 IBM employees signed up to read to second- and third-graders once a week on Wednesdays and Thursdays, Carlisle said.
This year's volunteers completed their final session with the students this week and will be honored at a ceremony at Mesquite Wednesday. Mesquite is in the Vail School District.
During a session, the students' classroom teacher writes down the assignment for the hour in a folder, and the mentor sends back predominantly positive comments.
The words "excellent" and "awesome" — with a couple of exclamation marks — highlighted the remarks West made about Jiana last week.
"I couldn't believe how focused you were!" West, a site-operations manager for IBM, told Jiana..
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