Organization gets volunteers to read allow to pre-schoolers
Special to The American
Keisha I. Patrick is one of the six new members appointed to the Board of Directors of Ready Readers, an award-winning not-for-profit organization committed to inspiring a love of reading in preschool children from low-income communities.
Patrick is an attorney with the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. She is a former Business Litigation Associate at Thompson Coburn LLP, and a former law clerk for the Honorable Carol E. Jackson, Chief Judge, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.
Ready Readers, a 501c3 not-for-profit organization in St. Louis, inspires preschool children from low-income communities to become readers by reading aloud to them and by increasing their exposure to quality books and stimulating reading-related activities.
Currently, more than 350 volunteers read weekly to more than 6,500 low-income 2-5 year old children who attend Head Starts or similar preschool programs in the City and County of St. Louis, as well as in adjacent areas. The same reader always reads to the same children, allowing the children to associate a special person with the fun of reading.
Six times during each school year and once in summer, readers also give the children personalized new books to take home for further enjoyment. This year, volunteers gave more than 41,000 high quality new books to the preschool children.
Ready Readers also is establishing lending libraries in preschools and continuing to give new and gently used donated books to needy classrooms.
The other new board members include Catherine Essner, Nahid Hashemi, Elizabeth Kaplan Goldenberg, Carole Olsen and Laura Winter.
If you enjoy reading aloud to young children, join Ready Readers as a volunteer reader. For details about becoming a volunteer, donating books or becoming a sponsor of Ready Readers, visit www.readyreaders-stlouis.com.