Reading To Rover has been a wonderful opportunity to share
the unconditional love of the dogs
with children who have reading problems
or who may not have a pet of their own.

It takes an especially calm and quiet pet to work with these children.

Peanut with a young reader and handler Cindy Ruel	To arrange a Reading To Rover event at your facility, email Fay Schultz at fibrofay@cox.net

The Visiting Pet Program has added an exciting new Reading to Rover event to our roster of visits. The STAIR program (Starting the Adventure in Reading) was founded in New Orleans in 1985 as a non-profit, volunteer based children's literacy program providing reading tutors to public school second grade students.

Each school year, second grade teachers identify students who may be at risk of academic failure. STAIR focuses on children who need assistance in reading and whose teachers believe their skills will blossom given one-on-one attention.

With the 2007-2008 school year, STAIR began relying on testing scores furnished by all of its participating schools who test the children using the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS).

Both fall and spring DIBELS test scores for each STAIR child were obtained from the schools to determine the success of the STAIR program. On average STAIR students' scores in Oral Reading Fluency increased more than 94%!

During the 2009-2010 school year STAIR will serve 250 children from over 30 schools at 29 sites in Orleans, Jefferson and Plaquemines Parishes.

As partners with the STAIR program, the Visiting Pet Program will offer Reading to Rover visits one Saturday of each month at 10:00 a.m. The location will rotate monthly between 3 STAIR sites.

If you are interested in participating in STAIR or any of the Reading to Rover events, please contact Fay Schultz, fibrofay@cox.net.

To learn more about STAIR visit their website at http://www.stairnola.org.