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We
welcome your letter to the editor.
Letters
should be no longer than 300 words and must be signed and include
a phone number. Longer letters may be edited for clarity and space.
Submissions should be typewritten if possible.
Deadline
for submission is noon on Monday.
Perspectives
Patti M.
Clark
Editor
Through
our Newspapers In Education
program
School’s back in session and
that can mean only one thing — well it can mean a lot of
things, but for the purpose of this column it can only mean one
thing — it’s time to send our newspapers into the
school system.
This will be the 10th year that The News-Herald has participated
in the Newspaper in Education program.
It’s also the 10th year that many of our sponsors have as
well.
Last year, we had a tremendous response from teachers who wanted
to utilize the newspapers in their classroom. We’ve only
last week begun taking requests for papers for this year’s
program, but it appears that teachers want to use this local newspaper
to help our students become better learners.
And why wouldn’t they? The newspaper is an up-to-date current
events curriculum in one neat package delivered to teachers’
doors.
Also, research shows that adults who regularly read newspapers
are the most educated and highest earners. Their success translates
into success for their cities and communities.
The idea behind the Newspapers in Education program is to develop
newspaper readers at a young age so they’ll have a habit
that they carry with them into adulthood.
If we raise children with the habit of reading their local newspaper,
we not only give them the added advantage of having an ever-renewing
textbook, we also instill in them a habit which benefits us as
a society.
Students use the papers for a number of activities. Saveway’s
grocery ad on the back page is often used to teach children about
budgets. Current events are an important part of the instruction
in some classes. The possibilities are endless because the paper
is always changing.
In addition, we’ll be starting a serial story in mid-September
geared toward primary and elementary students. It’s the
second installment of the “Woody” series that ran
on our pages last fall and was so popular at that time. In fact,
Woody and his friend, Chloe, visited the library over the summer
and local children filled the building to meet the friends they’d
made through the story.
Students can collect their stories each week, paste them into
a scrapbook we’ll have available and at the end of the 10
weeks, they’ll have a complete story to keep.
But we need sponsors to make this program a reality. Each paper
costs 25 cents a week or about $9 a year. That’s the cost
for one student. A classroom is $7.50 a week or $270 for the school
year. An entire grade level runs $45 a week.
The sponsorship covers the cost of getting the papers printed.
We don’t make any money off the papers that go into the
school system, but in order to send them, we need to be able to
cover our costs.
If you’ve been a sponsor in the past, we appreciate your
help and support — and so do the teachers and students.
Area businesses and individuals have been a part of the program
in the past. Even Superintendent Mark Cleveland personally covered
the cost of a class of students last year.
And the donation is tax-deductible.
We’ll be featuring the sponsors each week at the top of
the education page. Additionally, we’ll include the name
of the classroom they cover with their donation.
We’re also asking teachers to send us photos of their students
using The News-Herald in their classroom over the course of the
school year.
We’re excited about this program and the opportunity it
offers our students — the future leaders and business owners
of this community.
If you can help in any way, please let us know. We can’t
start these papers until the requests are covered by sponsors.
We have several billing options available to spread out the cost
of your sponsorship if necessary, or a one-time donation can help
offset these costs as well. We need your help. If you’d
like to be a part of this project, give Sherry Lyons a call at
484-3431. We look forward to hearing from you.
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