PROVIDENCE, RI – In an effort to help more Rhode Island families build their home libraries and spark a love of reading from an early age, U.S. Senator Jack Reed has teamed up with Reach Out and Read Rhode Island (RORRI) to deliver a $50,000 federal earmark that will help expand the organization’s early literacy program.

Senator Reed today joined with Aimee Falso, executive director of RORRI, Dr. Joseph Singer of Providence Community Health Centers’ (PCHC) Randall Square clinic, and local families to discuss how federal funding secured by Reed will help connect thousands of new Rhode Island children with free, age-appropriate books during pediatric doctor visits.

“A seemingly simple addition to regular visits with pediatricians – a new book and the doctor’s recommendation for parents to read aloud with their kids – can have serious, long-term positive impacts on the development, wellness, and academic prospects of our children. I’m proud to team up with Reach Out and Read and their tremendous partners within Rhode Island’s medical community to deliver this $50,000 federal earmark which will help get more books into the hands of more kids,” said Senator Reed.  “Providing free books for at-home reading is one of the most cost-effective things we can do to equip families with tools and strategies to strengthen their bonds and promote healthy brain and social development for our kids.  I will continue working to support programs like Reach Out and Read RI and expand efforts like my Innovative Approaches to Literacy program to ensure families have the tools they need to help their children thrive.”

Through its successful early childhood literacy program, RORRI partners with Rhode Island’s pediatric medical community at nearly 70 locations throughout the state to provide new, developmentally appropriate books to children starting at birth through age 5. During pediatric doctor visits, parents and caregivers are given free books and encouraged to read aloud with their children.

“For 25 years, Reach Out and Read Rhode Island has partnered with pediatricians and family medical doctors to promote early literacy,” said Aimee Falso, executive director of RORRI. “We’re excited about how this new funding secured by Senator Reed will help us meet a need in the community.”

Currently, RORRI, which celebrates its 25thanniversary this year, reaches 50,000 children across the state and provides more than 100,000 new books each year along with helpful information on building and improving language and literacy skills for parents and guardians.

The federal earmark secured by Senator Reed in the fiscal year 2024 appropriations law will allow RORRI, in partnership with PCHC, to diversify its collection of culturally relevant books for children and families and expand the free program to 6, 7, and 8-year-olds living in the Providence area.

Families from PCHC’s Randall Square clinic praised the program and highlighted the positive impact it has had on their children, with a mother, Mrs. G, saying that the program “is a good opportunity for my children to read and, now that they have extended the program, it is better because they are going to continue reading.”

Mrs. B, another mother whose family has benefitted from the program, also commended RORRI’s early literacy program, saying “my family is a reading family, so receiving these books is amazing. My kids look forward to going to see Dr. Singer because of the book. As soon as we get home, we read them all. Getting these books helps encourage my kids to read.”

A champion of childhood literacy in the U.S. Senate, Senator Reed authored the Prescribe a Book Act, which President Obama signed into law as part of the Every Student Succeeds Act (Public Law 114–95).  Reed’s legislation creates federal grant opportunities for pediatric early literacy initiatives, authorizing competitive funding that could be used to help doctors and nurses provide low-income parents with a children’s book to take home at every wellness visit.

Reed is also the author of the Right to Read Act, which would ensure that public schools across the country have fully-stocked and staffed school libraries. The Right to Read Act would address the disparities in access to school library resources by increasing federal investment in literacy by reauthorizing Comprehensive Literacy State Development Grants at $500 million, and the Innovative Approaches to Literacy program at $100 million, targeting critical literacy resources in high need communities.