Representatives of the SMILES (Southcoast Mentoring Initiative for Learning, Education and Service) mentoring program held a press conference in Fall River City Hall on August 14, 2008, to officially kick-off a ‘Help Kids Read’ campaign. The goal of the campaign, chaired by Fall River Mayor Robert Correia, is to recruit volunteer mentors for two new literacy-based SMILES mentoring programs for first-grade students. The programs will begin in October at the Doran and Greene elementary schools. Volunteers who sign up as mentors will spend an hour a week in an elementary school where they will read short stories and books with a first-grade student who presently reads below grade level. “Our goal is to place mentors with kids who need help at learning how to read”, said SMILES executive director Jim Mathes.  “We will be working closely with the teachers and reading coaches in the school, and will be using reading materials provided by the school.” SMILES, pioneered by Jim Mathes, has recruited over five hundred volunteer mentors in 26 programs in Fall River, New Bedford and Wareham.  Click here for the Herald News article about the announcement. For more information about the program, contact (508) 999-9300 or e-mail Nicole Almeida at nalmeida@smilesmentoring.org.

(Top row, left) SMILES executive director Jim Mathes opens the news conference in the Fall River Room outside the Mayor's office on the sixth floor of Government Center. (Top row, center) Citizens-Union Savings Bank president and CEO Nicholas M. Christ notes the importance of reading for future success in life. (Top row, right) Fall River school superintendent Nickolas Fischer, a member of the SMILES Board of Directors and himself a mentor, praised the initiative. (Middle row, left) Mayor Robert Correia, who serves as honorary chair of the initiative, adds his support to support success in school. (Middle row, right) Former Lincoln School Principal Barbara Terrio, who will be the program facilitator, underscores the importance of reading for success in school. (Bottom row, right) Ed Hill and Larry Snyder of People, Inc. who will serve as the coordinator of a new community learning center in the City's South End, listen to the announcement.