June 1, 2016
Tennesseans for Student Success announced today a statewide summer reading incentive to encourage reading, literacy, and volunteerism. TristarReads is a summer reading program to encourage Tennessee’s students to read 20 minutes a day throughout the summer. As well, the program encourages adult Tennesseans to visit libraries, summer camps, and other youth programs to read to students.
Students, parents, and adult volunteers, are asked to visit TristarReads.Com each week and log the hours they are reading. At the end of the summer (August 31st), Tennesseans for Student Success will award a $500 scholarship to a student in each Tennessee Grand Division who read the most hours over the summer. The process will be the same for logging adult volunteer reading hours with a $1,000 gift to the public library of the winning adult’s choice.
“While the summer can be a time of relaxation, vacation, and play, learning doesn’t need to stop” said communications director Ashley Elizabeth Graham. “Tennessee’s kids are the fastest improving in the nation in education. To protect and grow those gains, we must continue our focus on literacy throughout the year, even in summer. Studies show that reading 20 minutes each day not only translates to 1.8 million words in a year, it increases verbal fluency, helps retain vocabulary, and takes students into the heart of a story. TristarReads aims to get the whole family and broader community reading. We can’t wait to see how far our students come when they give themselves 20 minutes a day to read.”
Throughout the summer, reading events will take place across the state with celebrity readers, prizes and drawings, and programs. Stay tuned to TristarReads.Com or #TristarReads for more information.