Literacy Gets Another Big Lift In SMC This Summer

REDWOOD CITY, CA — Hundreds of San Mateo County families and educators will celebrate the conclusion Thursday of the fourth Big Lift Inspiring Summers, a four-week experience of literacy and health that helped more than 1,200 incoming kindergarten through second-grade children combat summer learning loss.

Set on John F. Kennedy Elementary School on Price Street in Daly City, Inspiring Summers has improved reading gain across all its seven participating school districts by an average of one and a half months for the past three years. All students lose some learning over the summer months, but students from families with low incomes tend to lose an average of two months in math and reading skills.

A partnership of San Mateo County libraries, school districts and BellXcell, Big Lift Inspiring Summers provides children from families with qualifying incomes a full-day program that includes literacy-rich curriculum in the morning

“Big Lift Inspiring Summers is an amazing opportunity for kids. The social emotional skills and mindfulness, along with the literacy and hands-on activities make the program fun for kids, and especially important for our rising kindergarteners, where this is frequently their first experience in the classroom,” said Supervisor Carole Groom, president of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors.

Launched in 2014, the Big Lift is an early learning literacy initiative in San Mateo County that seeks to increase countywide third-grade reading proficiency from 50 percent to 80 percent through four key interventions.

San Mateo County has provided $20 million in start-up funding from Measure K, a voter-approved sales tax revenue. On June 25, the Board of Supervisors allocated another $15.4 million in Measure K funds to support the Big Lift for two more years.

Inspiring Summers serves 1,200 incoming kindergarten through second-grade children in the county’s seven Big Lift school districts – Jefferson Elementary, South San Francisco Unified, San Bruno Park, Cabrillo Unified, La Honda – Pescadero Unified, Ravenswood City, and Redwood City.

More information is available by contacting Silicon Valley Community Foundation Director Andrea Jones at 650-450-5478 or via email at ajones@silconvalleycf.org.