Get ready to rock the reading!
This Friday, Jan. 28, the Wilton Education Foundation (WEF) kicks off its 11th annual Reading Rocks! at Miller-Driscoll School and Cider Mill School.
All students in grades pre K-5 are invited to participate in the Wilton Education Foundation’s fun and non-competitive “Reading Rocks!” Read-A-Thon. The goal is to encourage children to have fun reading while raising money for the Wilton Education Foundation — that means all proceeds benefit the Wilton Public Schools.
“Reading Rocks!” is WEF’s largest fundraiser, which over the last 10 years has collectively raised more than $370,000 for Wilton schools. This outstanding effort has helped WEF fund:
- Document Cameras used for remote learning technologies
- Middlebrook School greenhouse
- Recording studio used for the news at Miller-Driscoll
- Miller-Driscoll (student-run) postal system
- Recording studio at Wilton High School
- Learning Commons upgrade and the Video Studio at Cider Mill School
- Support of Middlebrook School’s Science Fair
- Odyssey of the Mind Sponsorship
- Ongoing professional development opportunities for teachers to support curriculum initiatives
Students at Miller-Driscoll and Cider Mill schools will start the fun with Dress Like a Rockstar Day on Friday, Jan. 28.
To participate in the read-a-thon, children will be able to choose their own reading goal, something that is completely up to the parent and child. Some ideas include: independent reading; reading with an adult or sibling; flipping through a picture book; reading via Zoom/Skype with a far-away relative … truly, anything that helps students celebrate reading goes.
The fundraising effort is 100% digital as participants can both register as well as accept and submit sponsorship pledges online. Students will create a Campaign Pledge Page online and ask friends/family to support their reading goals, or simply make their own one-time donation without creating a personalized page, by Donating to Reading Rocks!
Pledges are suggested in $5 increments in support of each child’s overall commitment to read more, rather than a per-page or per-book challenge. Organizers encourage each student to try to raise at least $25.
All pledges must be completed no later than Friday, Feb. 11.
Then, students will have from Feb. 12-26 to complete their reading goals
As part of Reading Rocks! and the month-long celebration of reading, Miller-Driscoll and Cider Mill will mark Wednesday, Feb. 2 which is World Read Aloud Day.
As of Feb. 11, the Miller-Driscoll pre K-second Grade and the Cider Mill House with the highest participation percentage will earn fun participation prizes!
And for every $5 raised by Feb. 11, Each student will also earn one chance per every $5 raised by Feb. 11, to be entered into a drawing to win an iPad or Kindle Fire. (WEF will award one Kindle Fire per pre K-second grade at Miller-Driscoll and one per House at Cider Mill; one iPad Grand Prize will be awarded to one student across all grades pre K-5 (iPad or a gift card of equivalent value to the Apple Store or Amazon).
WEF officials extended thanks to the Stroup family for sponsoring this program, as well as all the students and their families and friends who support it.