A United Way of Delaware statewide summer reading initiative receives national recognition.
The Get Delaware Reading Summer literacy initiative is named a 2026 Library of Congress Literacy Awards Success Practices Honoree in the Building Whole-Community Literacy Ecosystems category.
The initiative is an approach to turn summer into a season for learning and address summer learning loss.
The Get Delaware Reading program embeds evidenced based literacy assistance in camps kids are already attending.
The program would have camps get the kids to read 30 minutes for three days a week.
Michelle Taylor is the president and CEO of the United Way of Delaware.
"So, it didn't matter if kids were going to Claymont Community Center in North Wilmington, or they were attending First State Community Action down in Seaford, and everywhere in between kids were getting the same exact support. And that's what we've been able to do. So after a couple years, we realized we didn't just stop the loss, but kids actually got gains," said Taylor.
Taylor notes they see the gains because there are pre and post-tests, and that makes the initiative unique.
She says this program is a collaboration.
"This does not work without the districts without all the community partners that are working on this. Their staff, their team, the parents," said Taylor.
Taylor notes the program worked with over 20 organizations, 16 school districts, 22 charters -- about 60 locations in total.
