Last week the Campaign for Grade Level Reading, announced their 2021 Bright Spots – regional grade level reading programs around the country with exceptional efforts to respond to the COVID-19 crisis over the past year.  AIM Institute is thrilled to have been highlighted in the work of our partner and local 2021 CGLR Bright Spot – Read by 4th. The Campaign for Grade Level Reading looked for solutions that seemed especially effective, replication-worthy, and/or deserving of being sustained during the post-COVID period when choosing their regional bright spots.

A collaborative effort by funders, nonprofit partners, business leaders, government agencies, states and communities to ensure that more children in low-income families succeed in school and graduate prepared for college, a career and active citizenship, CGLR focuses on promoting early school success as an important building block of more hopeful futures for children in economically challenged families and communities.

Read by 4^th was recognized for several of their initiatives including Parent Workshop on Early Reading Skills (PWERS) which includes support and partnership with AIM to provide families with the information they need to support their child's learning through the science of reading. Read by 4^th was able to provide workshop information online during COVID. The Read by 4th Youtube Channel had over 14,000 unique viewers, 98% of which were for videos related to PWERS in the first 90 days of the pandemic.

Read by 4^th was also recognized for their support of teachers during the pandemic through the Teach Reading Virtually website created in collaboration with AIM and Drexel University. The site followed research which suggests that using of a variety e-learning software increases the effectiveness remote education to create a location that integrates a collection of online learning resources under the organizational structure of the science of reading instruction, with different sections for Phonological Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary, Comprehension and other resources.