Volunteers

Thank you for your interest in helping with our program! Guys Read and Gals Read depend on our amazing volunteers to carry stories and good times into the classes, libraries, and hearts of 4th graders throughout the North Star Borough School District.  At the District’s request, our program is focused on that age group because 4th grade is when a lot of kids stop reading as a pastime. 
 

Reading print (instead of a screen) for pleasure leads to improved overall reading skills and promotes much better comprehension of knowledge.  However, many kids around this age decide that reading isn’t fun! Introducing adult readers as role models and showing reluctant readers that some books can be a lot of fun encourages students to read and to use the library.  Your most important job as a volunteer is to have fun reading with the kids. 
 

Everything you’ll need is delivered to each school before the volunteers arrive. The boys and girls are assembled eight times in the fall and again in the winter during their half-hour lunchtime, and a member of the school staff will be present.  As the students eat lunch, one volunteer reads a preselected graphic novel for twenty minutes while another volunteer runs the projector.  We only read the first parts of the books, and multiple copies of the featured books are donated to each school library so on their own the students can complete reading the books which have been the most popular at all the schools since Guys Read Gals Read began nearly 20 years ago.

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More detailed training takes place the week before sessions start, so you can get extra tips and tricks about running a projector, reading to a crowd, and more. After the training you’re on the schedule and good to go.
 

Should your schedule be limited to certain times, days, and locations, we can accommodate that. Just let us know your restrictions on the Volunteer Registration and we can almost always work the schedule so that you can read with the kids.