About Us
Place an Ad
Submit a Letter
Send a Comment
Media Kit
Entertainment
Financial News
Health News
No publications or editions were found!
|
 |
|
|
NIE reaching more students
Posted: Monday, Sep 08, 2008 - 08:48:14 am CDT
by Heidi Hood - Staff writer
Last year, the Uvalde Leader-News started a partnership with local schools to provide newspapers to students throughout the area called Newspapers in Education or NIE.
According to Olga Charles, NIE coordinator at the Leader-News (also known as the “newspaper lady” in area classrooms), she has witnessed tremendous growth since her first day of work in August 2007.
“We started in September,” she remembered of the program's inception almost exactly a year ago. Since then, Charles has signed up six schools and is “still working on two.”
“There is Benson, the entire third and fourth grade; Robb, the entire third grade; Sacred Heart School's fifth and six grade; Anthon, third grade; Batesville second through six; and the Charter School, third through fifth,” she listed, counting them off on her fingers.
She said right now she is working on getting more grade levels signed up in the different schools and is also looking for funding for Knippa School as well.
“They want newspapers,” Charles said.
Part of the excitement of the last year has been introducing the paper to children through the area and seeing how they have grown and developed by using the newspaper in their classrooms.
For example, she said students are learning how to budget.
“I didn't know how to budget in third or fourth grade,” Charles said. “They are learning budgets. Many of the teachers, on their bulletin boards, it says ‘what can I buy with a hundred dollars,' and they have a budget they have to follow and they can't go over that.”
Charles said that she has also witnessed more awareness on the part of the students about what is going on in the community.
“They learn a lot,” Charles said. “They are beginning to recognize politicians and other things they see in the paper.”
Charles said students love reading the sports pages because they often see people they know.
“It makes them feel good that they have read who is in the paper and what they are doing,” she said.
“The children, I think, become better citizens because they know what's going on and they get involved,” she said.
Charles explained that she loves her job because of the way she is able to offer students this look at the real world via the newspaper, and the students, it seems, love her.
She described how when she is out, she will have students point her out to parents, siblings and friends as the “newspaper lady.” Often the recognition is followed by the question “Are we going to get the newspaper?”
Charles' goal is, she said, is to get every student a chance to work with the newspaper. Right now she is working at Flores Elementary School and hopes to be able to tackle Uvalde Junior High and Uvalde High School some time down the road.
One subscription of the Leader-News allows two students to read the periodical once a week, Charles explained, because it is a bi-weekly paper.
“So, 20 subscriptions cover 40 students,” she said, explaining that with how things are organized, two classrooms share subscriptions.
Each subscription is $14 for the school year and the money has been coming from area businesses, civic organizations and individual donors mostly. And while those have been generous, Charles hopes to raise even more funds for the project. “We are building the leaders of tomorrow by making these children readers who are informed about their community. I would like to eventually touch every elementary school and have every elementary child with a newspaper,” she said.
A large part of her job is fundraising and the upcoming Swing for Education golf tournament hosted by the Leader-News is part of that ongoing effort.
“The golf tournament is Sept. 20 in Concan at the Club at ConCan,” Charles said, adding that all proceeds go to the NIE program.
The entry fee is $100 per four-man team and includes a green fee, cart fee, goody bag, tacos, doughnuts and beverages. A barbecue meal will also be served after the tournament during the awards ceremony.
Along with supporting the NIE program, participants will also receive prizes.
For more information, contact Charles at the Leader-News by calling 278-3335.
As for Charles' goals for the rest of the year, that is fairly easy. She will continue to work to raise money to get newspapers into classrooms, so that students can continue to “know what is going on in town, to have their own ideas and think.”
|
|
|
|
|
