Reach Out and Read of Greater New York, Inc.

In aiming to create a better avenue for building early literacy skills in children ages 0-5, our program seeks to provide books and literacy guidance to the children and families who participate in Reach Out and Read of Greater New York. While Reach Out and Read of Greater New York touches families of diverse economic and racial backgrounds, in NYC, Long Island, and the Greater Hudson Valley, the majority of the children and families served in our program are in the lower-income bracket. It is our mission to get books in the hands and homes of those most in need. By the age of 5 children in our program have a collection (on average) of 10 books in their homes before they enter kindergarten.

Our first line of strategy is working with pediatricians and medical providers who manage a Reach Out and Read of Greater New York program at their hospitals or medical centers. We train pediatricians in our model When a child comes in for a well-child visit Reach Out and Read of Greater New York is also a part of a few literacy-based organizations adding to continua of services around literacy resources, which partner together to help support the whole family. We also aim to give parents and caregivers the tools and coaching they need to empower them to help their children be ready for school. Our organization, while separate from the flagship organization, Reach Out and Read located in Boston, does work in collaboration with the Reach Out and Read headquarters as well as other affiliates in our network. We also partner with multiple publishers to supply diverse and age-appropriate books our 233 sites in the New York and Greater New York area.

Additionally, currently, in the time of COVID-19, we have added virtual programming which includes daily read alouds and bilingual workshops for families. Although this programming is being created in response to the pandemic, we plan to use the recorded videos as teaching tools and resources for families and pediatric medical providers in the future as well.

Currently, to meet our goals, Reach Out and Read of Greater New York encourages providers and site coordinators to take the online training through myROR, the database developed by our National affiliate. We also engage in targeted fundraising and seeking creative ways to increase our book support capacity through programs like “Adopt-a-Site.” Adopt-a-Site is where a generous donor decides to support a site whether monetarily for the purchase of books or by hosting book drives for the site. We are constructing a volunteer training program as well as cultivating in-kind book donations and partnering with city council initiatives and local collective impact projects.

As we continue to find ways to improve on fidelity to our model, Reach Out and Read has had success over the past few years, which includes being asked to pilot new programming. In partnership with City’s First Readers, the program Books In The Nursery was born. The goal was to distribute one title I Will Talk To You, Little One by Phyllis Grann and famous illustrator Tomi dePaola to new parents and caregivers upon the birth of their child. More than 275,000 copies of I Will Talk To You, Little One have been distributed in English and Spanish to families at our participating hospital sites. Secondly, we have identified program sites working with special populations such as the underhoused and homeless, and children and families with special needs. Lastly, we have expanded our multilingual book distribution efforts by providing books beyond English and Spanish. We now offer books in Haitian-Creole, Manadrin, Arabic and French.
We have consistently met 50% of our population’s book needs over the past 5 years → increasing the percentage of book needs met moving forward. We have been asked to participate in 3 pilot programs: First 1000 Days, Read the City Campaign and United for Brownsville collective impact project. Most recently, we have launched a robust virtual programming as a response to the COVID pandemic.
Our future goals are to increase consistency across sites, new hands-on provider training, volunteer training, meeting the book needs, more virtual programming, continuing to partner and grow with the other city initiatives.