If kids can’t read, this writer is out of a job. Which is why this writer was up bright and early last Friday morning to greet 100 students who, at the end of their third grade year, were not reading at grade level.
If kids can’t read by the end of their third grade year, there is a high probability they will become high school drop-outs. Which is why it was so heartening to see the logos on 
the shirts of the kids streaming out of the buses – Third Grade Academy – and to know that, for four summer weeks, these at-risk readers would be in an environment where reading is not only taught but championed, where their difficulties would be pinpointed and addressed, where the teacher-student ratio is two to ten.
If kids can’t read by the end of third grade, they will fall further and further behind, every year they’re in school. Which is why the students that didn’t show up to for the bus ride that morning were visited at home by an adult and asked if there was a problem…told they were missed…told it wasn’t too late to take part in the day’s instruction and activities.
If kids can’t read, they lose the opportunities that await them and we lose the contributions they might have made. Which is why this writer will do anything she can to support the Third Grade Academy here in Richmond, Indiana.