We received this letter from Governor Jay Inslee praising Page Ahead’s many years of work and highlighting the achievements of the Page Ahead community on International Literacy Day 2021.
Author: Lisa Ceniceros
Page Ahead gives thousands of books to kids across Washington
“Despite the challenges involved with social distancing requirements and remote learning, Page Ahead, a program dedicated to closing the literacy achievement gap experienced by at-risk children, was able to provide over 145,000 books to kids in Washington this summer. ‘It was super important and extra challenging,’ says Rebecca Brinbury, Page Ahead’s Development Manager.“
Social media fundraisers make a big difference for young readers
We are always so honored when someone creates a social media fundraiser to benefit Page Ahead. Marcia Rutan, a longtime supporter, decided to celebrate her 70th birthday in 2020 with a Facebook fundraiser and ended up raising more than $1,400 from dozens of friends—that’s enough to give 396 books to 33 kids! We just had to find out how she did it, and she graciously let us pick her brain.
Page Ahead: Why did you decide to do a fundraising event to celebrate your birthday?
Marcia Rutan: I planned a big party this year to celebrate my 70th, but that tanked due to COVID. Since I connect with many friends and family on Facebook, I trusted they would want to help celebrate my birthday this way. Fundraising on Facebook is quite painless compared to setting up events and usually successful. People can give any amount and stay anonymous or go public. I love books, care deeply for the well-being of children, and am committed to breaking the cycle of racism and its impacts in our country. Page Ahead supports all of these priorities so was my top pick this year!
Page Ahead: How did you spread the word and encourage people to donate? Any tips for someone else who might want to do something similar to celebrate a special event in their own life?
Marcia Rutan: Facebook makes it easy; a lot of not-for-profits, including Page Ahead, are already on their list which makes it a simple select and go. Facebook provides an automatic blurb for the fundraising page, which many people use. I like to customize it with my own enthusiastic comments. Once the page is up, I track daily who is donating and thank each donor personally on Facebook. Facebook continually shows the cumulative donations on your fundraising page, and this makes it exciting as you watch the amount rise, hit target, and even surpass the amount you set as your goal. I make sure also to donate to other people’s fundraisers, even small amounts. It’s a great way to keep money circulating for good and to celebrate people’s birthdays, instead of, or in addition to, traditional gifts.
Thank you, Marcia–and happy birthday!
To set up a Facebook fundraiser like Marcia, go to https://www.facebook.com/fundraisers/ then click the “Select Nonprofit” button, type “Page Ahead,” and follow the step-by-step prompts.
Twitter and Instagram
Twitter and Instagram don’t have official fundraising mechanisms like Facebook does, but you can still get creative in crowdsourcing donations. For example, @girlimbooked on Instagram encouraged her followers to post her to #teachstack hashtag, and for each post, she donated $1 to Page Ahead (see below). Please feel free to get in touch with us at contact us if you’d like support in setting up something like that!
Follett Book eFairs and nonprofits team up for summer reading
“When the Covid-19 crisis forced the closure of schools across the country, the abrupt change resulted in many already vulnerable children and families facing additional challenges. A lack of access to food, and to learning tools including the internet and books, have been among the most pressing obstacles, along with mounting concern about the double whammy of spring school disruptions and summer learning slide. In an effort to assist families facing such hurdles, Follett and two nonprofit early literacy organizations—Page Ahead in Seattle and Start Reading Now in Minneapolis—worked together to ensure that kids from low-income families received books to read over the summer break.”
Page Ahead donates 15,000 books to Federal Way students
“Although schools are out for the summer, learning doesn’t stop for Federal Way students.
Kindergartners, first graders and second graders in Federal Way schools are receiving 12 books each for free from Page Ahead Children’s Literacy Program, a nonprofit that works to close the literacy achievement gap for young readers in majority low-income communities.”
Words matter
Literacy, at the core, is a social justice issue. The ability to read gives one the ability to fully participate as a citizen of the world. When you look at the history of oppression, from the ancient Greeks to American slavery—all oppressors limit access to literacy as a key strategy to amass and retain power.
Black lives matter. We know and express that in the work we do and in the children we reach; however, now is the time for us to state it loudly and explicitly. Page Ahead stands in solidarity with those protesting the unjust murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, and countless more. We stand in solidarity with those protesting the pervasive racism and oppression that helped lead to their deaths.
As an organization that works to close the literacy gap for students in Washington, we see firsthand the systemic inequities in our society every day. Page Ahead serves children in communities experiencing low income across Washington. But when 90 percent of the children we serve are children of color, it’s a grim testament to just how systemic inequities in education, housing, access to credit, healthcare, and criminal justice have a compounding negative impact on people of color, especially Black and Indigenous families.
Words matter.
And our actions matter. Page Ahead recognizes we must do more and do so with urgency and humility.
We will join with like-minded organizations in amplifying voices that Black Lives Matter, and that institutional racism must end.
We will listen even more. We will go deeper, examining more fully how we are part of systemic racism and how we can bring more self-awareness to break that cycle.
We publicly recommit to our equal-opportunity and equity-minded hiring practices, board development efforts, and volunteer recruitment. The philanthropic and education sectors in the Seattle area have historically been very white spaces, and it is incumbent on organizations, including Page Ahead, to dismantle barriers to diverse participation—a process which will only benefit us all.
We are also more determined than ever to continue our mission to deliver books to kids who need them. Books that are as diverse and wonderful as the children we serve.
Page Ahead will continue to use its buying power to push publishers to increase the number and variety of diverse children’s books available. It’s crucial that all young readers see themselves in the books they read. As an organization that purchases and gives away more than 180,000 books each year, we can and will work even harder to ensure books celebrate children of color.
We will also ask our partners, donors, and community to prioritize seeking out diverse books for the children in their lives and show the industry that there is a demand from buyers of all backgrounds.
We can’t hesitate. Children of color, especially Black children, are too often furthest from educational justice in our schools. That is wrong. Those children’s lives matter. Black lives matter.
Angie Drzewiecki
Page Ahead is pleased to present the 2020 Sarajane Beal Award for Volunteer Excellence to Angie Drzewiecki.
Angie began volunteering in 2016 and quickly became an integral part of Page Ahead’s programs. Angie is so passionate about Page Ahead that she is at just about every event possible. She has read to children at school reading events; she is also a Story Time volunteer and a Book Up Summer book fair helper.
Angie has also been a successful table captain for our A Taste for Reading luncheon the for the last three years, filling her table of 12 (and then some) with generous donors. Angie is especially powerful as a coordinator of her fellow volunteers. She has been the lead coordinator for her big group of dedicated members of Trilogy for Kids who help at not one, not two, but more than 11 book fairs, each spring, for the past few years! These teams of 4–5 helpers are fantastic. Angie coordinates who goes where, what day, who drives the carpool, etc. They are a dream to work with and the schools request them to come back each year.
Thank you, Angie! You truly make a difference at Page Ahead!
Ed Lab Live: Improving literacy during the pandemic
“Even with e-books, tablets and an array of screens, research shows that physical books still play an important role in kids’ learning how to read. That was one of the points made by Susan Dibble, the executive director of the early literacy program Page Ahead.
In this edition of Ed Lab Live, Dibble speaks about how her organization is partnering with schools across the state to get books into the hands of young readers.”
Read more and watch the interview at the Seattle Times’s Education Lab.
Rion Dudley
Page Ahead is proud to present the Sarajane Beal Award for Volunteer Excellence to Rion Dudley.
A volunteer for Page Ahead since 2013, Rion quickly became an integral part of Page Ahead’s Story Time program. This program places trained volunteers in prek–kindergarten classrooms to read to children, sing songs, and complete a craft. The children take great delight in working on their craft project, and Rion plays an important role in that by keeping the craft section fully stocked. If you’ve ever prepared materials for children’s crafts, you know what a big job this is! It’s always fun to walk by Rion and his co-volunteer Barbara and hear them discussing with great seriousness the state of the tongues for the frog craft or fire for the dragon craft. A former professor at Cornish College of the Arts, Rion has put his artistic side to work for Page Ahead by designing holiday cards and crafts.
Thank you, Rion, for your commitment to Page Ahead and the children we serve!
Summer reading program helps fill the gaps for Washington kids
“Page Ahead is a nonprofit that focuses on closing the literacy achievement gap for kids in majority low-income communities across Washington by building home libraries and providing reading resources. They are a major partner of Seattle Public Schools, and as the school year ended last month, they gave thousands of K–2 kids in Seattle (and across the state) 12 free books each for summer reading through their Book Up Summer program. With the COVID-19 school closures exacerbating existing inequities for our students, having reading material at home is more crucial than ever.”