Kicking off its 18th year, Reading Buddies is a continuing outreach effort of Lincoln County Association for Home and Community Education (HCE), UW Extension Family Living Programs. The Reading Buddies program is designed to provide free books to promote literacy and the start of a lifelong love of reading in young children. Lincoln County Reading Buddies program partners with MAPS Pine River School for Young Learners (PRSYL), Parkside Preschool Center and Tomahawk Head Start.
In Lincoln County, over 60 adult volunteers work directly with children in their school/childcare settings once a month for 15-30 minutes by reading a book and doing a related activity with a small group of 2-5 children. Each child is given a copy of the book to take home. At the end of the school year, each child will have eight or more books for their home library. Reading Buddies provides books at a crucial time in a child’s life; the early intervention pays off well beyond a child’s formative preschool years.
As an entirely volunteer based organization, Reading Buddies has been able to provide free books and promote literacy in the Merrill community for 18 years due to the generous contributions received from local civic organizations, clubs, businesses, financial institutions, Parkside Preschool, PRSYL and private individuals. The Tomahawk Head Start program is fully funded by the Tomahawk Star Foundation.