Ever feel like the rope in a tug-of-war match? You want to make a difference in the world, but life’s daily demands keep yanking you away. 

The good news is, there’s an easy way for one person to transform a life. We’re hoping to do it a thousand times over.

It’s the Early Grade Reading Achievement Project, a partnership between United Way of the Battle Creek and Kalamazoo Region, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Calhoun Intermediate School District to help young children read well. Volunteers who serve as Reading Buddies are the secret ingredient to its success.

We’re recruiting 1,000 volunteers to be Reading Buddies for students in Battle Creek and Lakeview schools. All it takes is 30 minutes a week—two 15-minute sessions with one of two students assigned to a Reading Buddy for the year, listening and encouraging them as they read.

Research shows that kids who read proficiently by fourth grade are four times more likely to graduate high school. Learning to read is the focus of their early years in school; after that, they’re reading to learn. That has a huge impact on the rest of their lives—what they learn, how well they learn, what lifelong career they choose.

The Early Grade Reading Achievement Project has a proven track record of improving reading proficiency. That’s why we’re eager to expand it so that every child who wants or needs a Reading Buddy can have one.

Think you can’t swing it? I know a volunteer who signed on as a Reading Buddy but constantly worried that his crazy schedule would never allow it. That was three years ago. Today he’s one of our most faithful and committed Reading Buddies, working with the same student so that she’s become an exceptional reader.

That’s one life transformed. There are at least a thousand more out there. 

One of them is waiting for you.

If you’re interested in being a Reading Buddy, you can sign up online at www.handsonbc.org, or contact Ben Nyhoff at bnyhoff@uwbckr.org or 269-962-9538. There are opportunities in several schools throughout the region.