Books & Breakfast: Rising up to help struggling readers

In early November, Reading Partners South Carolina hosted our annual fundraising event, Books & Breakfast. Almost 200 community supporters joined us at the historic Francis Marion Hotel for a morning of inspiration and generosity featuring co-founder and chairman of DonorsChoose.org, Peter Bloom. Peter spoke on the important role communities play in “rising up” to solve educational challenges facing our nation, by activating ordinary people to be agents of change.

Books & Breakfast is the cornerstone event of our Page Turner Society, a group of supporters who generously sponsor one or more Reading Partners students for an entire year in the Reading Partners program. At the beginning of the breakfast, Reading Partners board members sponsored 60 struggling readers and challenged attendees to sponsor an additional 60 students by the end of the morning. Dr. Michael Griggs, the principal at Hunley Park Elementary, encouraged the room to join Reading Partners’ mission, stressing the transformative power of one-on-one tutoring. During his stirring speech, guests not only met this challenge, but exceeded the day’s goal by sponsoring an additional 79 students – a total of 139 struggling readers sponsored at the event!

The CEO of Reading Partners, Karine Apollon, was also in attendance at the event, and reiterated to attendees that “[they] truly make our work possible.” Books & Breakfast is an annual reminder that the outpouring of support we receive from our community has the power to change students’ lives for years to come. We are so excited to welcome new and returning members to our Page Turner Society.

If you would like to join this year’s Page Turners in sponsoring at least one student, please click here to make your gift today.

We want to extend a special thank you to Gregory Blake Sams Events for designing such a warm, fun space for attendees.