Thousands of kids improve reading skills helped by mentors from local business

A special event has been held at St Joseph’s Primary School in west Belfast  to celebrate the fact that Business in the Community’s Time to Read programme has helped thousands of children develop their reading skills with the help of mentors from local businesses. 

The Time to Read programme has enjoyed great success over the past nine years and none of it would have been possible without the support of local businesses.

The programme is designed to build a love of books and reading at an early age. It brings together mentors from local companies and children from local schools to engage in paired reading exercises.  

The programme started from humble beginnings in 1999 with approximately 50 school children in the Belfast area receiving mentoring. However, since then it has snowballed into one of Business in the Community's flagship programmes with 700 children all across Northern Ireland participating every week. 

Graeme McKimm, Education Manager at Business in the Community, said

"The Time to read programme has enjoyed great success over the past nine years and none of it would have been possible without the support of local businesses. Over 100 companies across Northern Ireland now provide Time to Read volunteers for local schools.

"The long term commitment from some of our companies is very impressive.  55 employees currently volunteering in this paired reading programme were presented with awards celebrating the fact that have been engaged in the programme for over three years.  Some of them have even taken part for the last eight years, since Time to Read began."

Countless teachers, volunteers and children have highlighted the importance and effectiveness of this scheme and now a major evaluation of the programme is currently underway, supported by Atlantic Philanthropies and carried out by Queen’s University. A sample of 800 children, some engaged in Time to Read, some not engaged, has been measured over two years in 50 schools. The results will be published in the autumn. 

Success Stories

The Time to Read programme has many success stories, for example, two Time to Read volunteers, Fiona Elder and Caren Hasson from KPMG, told the audience at St Joseph's of their experiences in the programme and how they developed a World Book Day competition with participating children at the school. These volunteers were delighted when one of the children, Tomas, won first prize in a national competition, Beast Quest, with his entry beating 2000 other participants.

Further Information 

 For further information on the Time to Read programme contact Graeme McKimm on (028) 9046 0606 or log onto www.timetoni.com.