Alumna's literacy program participates in Facebook challenge

By: Stephanie Wong

Posted: 2/4/08

The Facebook "Causes Giving Challenge" finished Friday afternoon, raising funds and awareness for alumna Julie Katz's program, called "Everybody Wins! South Florida."

The fifty-day contest between several nonprofit startups awarded monetary prizes to the nonprofit causes with the highest number of donors. Katz's program, which supports children's literacy, received $2,931 in donations and a $1,000 award from the Case Foundation.

"We can really use the money," said Katz, the executive director of Everybody Wins! South Florida. "We fortunately have a very low annual budget compared to most programs, but we still need funds to keep the program going, for paying the school coordinators, volunteer recruitment and office supplies."

Everybody Wins! matches at-risk children with adult volunteers who help them develop much-needed positive impressions of reading. These volunteers, usually businesspeople from companies near the elementary school, spend their lunch hour reading level-appropriate books to second and third graders who are falling behind in literacy.

"Often reading is stressful for these kids, and they don't like to read because of the pressure. So our volunteers just read aloud to them. Fun books, silly books," said Katz.

The program has succeeded in exciting the students. Katz reports that students "bounce in their seats" when the readers arrive and then beg them to keep reading or start new books as the reading time comes to a close.

Children in Everybody Wins! have also shown improvements in behavior.

"Last year, after three weeks, a teacher in one of our schools came up to me and told me that one particular student was doing great, opening up and becoming more personable," said Katz.

But Katz added that the program needs more time to be properly evaluated.

"Though I believe in this program and have dedicated my life to this, I had to remind her [that] it's only been three weeks," said Katz. "But the teacher was sure it was making a difference, because this was the only time this student had one-on-one time with an adult."

The combination of stress-free reading and personal attention works so successfully that Everybody Wins! South Florida has expanded to serving four schools and 120 students since its founding last year.

Katz is proud of the program's accomplishments and finds her job to be a rewarding combination of passions.

"I always knew whatever I'd do would be working with people," said Katz.

After graduating from Washington University in St. Louis in 2002 with a degree in psychology, Katz earned a master's degree in nonprofit management from Brandeis University. Now she is working to close the literacy gap among elementary school students so that poor readers do not fall behind in education.

According to the program's Web site, 55 percent of participating students at the poor-reading level reported that they enjoyed reading, whereas only 31 percent of control-group students did so. Sixteen percent of poor readers improved their classroom behavior compared to only three percent of students not in the program.

Katz appreciated all the donors who contributed to the Facebook challenge, and predicted future success for Everybody Wins! South Florida.

"This program is sustainable, and it really works," she said.