December 2, 2005
Section: Local
Edition: Courier Edition
Page: D1, NEWS01
CHAD WEIHRAUCH Staff Writer, Courier News
The "Reach Out and Read" program was started about four years ago to give children access to a spoonful of literacy education as they wait for a doctor's appointment.
The program has dwindled over the past year as a small grant has gradually run dry, but supporters say they're committed to continuing it, for both the English- and Spanish-speaking kids whose eyes light up as they latch onto books in the waiting room."You watch these kids hugging these books -- that's what keeps me coming back here," Maureen Greenbaum said.
Greenbaum, a Union County College instructor who lives in Watchung, said two other professors, Sue Stock and Judy Mayer, started "Reach Out and Read" a few years ago. Greenbaum became involved within the past year, she said, helping Stock bring in new books to replenish those given away.There were three goals, she said: Have doctors give each preschool-age child who shows up for an appointment a new book in English or Spanish, provide lots of donated books in the health center's waiting room to occupy young minds and ask volunteers to read to children as they wait.
"Here's a book -- here's a pill," she said, summing up the mindset. "This is here to get you started."The health center's human resources manager, Yolande Leonard-Cooper, said she believed the initial grant for the program was about $1,500 and fit with the aim of providing low-cost or free health services to the community. In this case, that amounts to a small intellectual health service, too, with volunteers -- usually students from a college or Plainfield High School -- sitting and reading to children.
"They come in and sit and read to the patient while they're waiting to be seen by the doctor," Leonard-Cooper said. "We just want to get kids motivated to read."About half the children seen by doctors at the health center are Hispanic, she added, which increases the center's need for Spanish-language materials.
Greenbaum said she stops by the center every so often to provide more books, and she emphasized that the Spanish-language reading materials are important, because they help parents who perhaps are not proficient in English connect with their kids and help them learn."If the parent can't read the book to the child, then we've lost it, because children emulate their parents," she said.
i›Chad Weihrauch can be reached at (908) 707-3137 or cweihrau@gannett.com.What you can do
Anyone interested in volunteering with "Reach Out and Read" at the Plainfield Health Center or donating materials can call Yolande Leonard-Cooper at (908) 753-6401, Ext. 150.