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Program information
Developer and contact
Developed by the Oregon Children's Foundation, Start Making a Reader Today® is self-distributed. Address: 219 NW 12th Ave, Suite 203, Portland, OR 97209. Email: smart@getsmartoregon.org. Web: www.getsmartoregon.org. Telephone: (503) 937-4800 or (877) 598-4633.
Scope of use
Since its start in 1992, the program reports serving 100,000 children in the state of Oregon through more than 2.3 million volunteer hours. It has also given students more than 1.4 million books. The goal for the 2006–07 school year is to serve 12,000 students in 280 schools in 32 of Oregon's 36 counties.
Teaching
SMART® accepts applications from schools where at least 40% of students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. The SMART® organization hires a part-time school coordinator for each participating school who works under the direction of a regional manager. The coordinator recruits and trains volunteers, is present at the school during all program hours, schedules reading sessions, and serves as primary contact for school personnel. In rural areas, SMART® offers the SMART® Kit as an alternative delivery model. The kit assists a school and its surrounding community to implement the program themselves without a regional manager. It includes instructions for setting up the program, organizing classrooms, recruiting volunteers, scheduling the intervention into classrooms, and coordinating the overall program.
Once the program is in place, the SMART® organization assists the school with materials, books, volunteer training, and technical assistance. SMART® staff facilitate the creation of local Leadership Councils, made up of school and community members, which assist in local fundraising and serve as local advocates for SMART®. In SMART® Kit communities, this group is known as a Leadership Committee and takes on primary responsibility for program operation.
Volunteers, who range from high school students to senior citizens, undergo a 1–2 hour long training that provides an introduction to the program and to reading strategies instruction. Volunteers are trained by the SMART® coordinator where the program is housed. They draw on the handbook that outlines the four SMART® reading strategies: reading to students, reading with students, re-reading, and asking comprehension questions. Using these strategies, volunteers tutor students one-on-one for 30 minutes twice a week throughout the school year.
Cost
The SMART® program is funded through a wide range of statewide and local activities involving businesses, foundations, and individuals. There is no cost to a school participating through the standard delivery model. Local fundraising pays the salary of program coordinators, though some program coordinators volunteer and thus do not incur this cost.
For communities using the SMART® Kit delivery model, local groups raise money to cover the cost of SMART® licensing and for the salary of a school coordinator. Overall program cost runs approximately $300 a year per child. This cost is largely covered through donations to the SMART® parent organization.
