Basketball Stars Hold Reading Rally at Gretna School
By Stephen Maloney
Students at Kate Middleton Elementary School in Gretna got a lesson on the importance of reading from a host of National Basketball Association and Women’s National Basketball Association All-Stars, MVPs, Olympians and a former Harlem Globetrotter Monday morning as their school’s library received an infusion of much- needed books.
As part of this weekend’s NBA All-Star Game festivities, the NBA Cares 2008 Community Caravan held a Reading Rally in the Middleton gymnasium for third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students. The event was led by Basketball Hall of Fame member “Big” Bob Lanier and WNBA Community Ambassador and 1994 Olympic gold-medal winning U.S. women’s basketball team member Jennifer Azzi.
Former NBA star Felipe Lopez, Indiana Fever star and gold-medal winner Tamika Catchings, former WNBA star and Harlem Globetrotter Lynnette Woodard, New Orleans Hornets star Chris Paul’s mother, Robin Paul, and brother, Charles Paul and Los Angeles Sparks rookie Sidney Spencer joined Lanier and Azzi at Middleton.
Each star read his or her favorite children’s book to Middleton students after Lanier and Azzi impressed upon the students the importance of reading.
“Who’s excited about reading?” the 6-foot-6 Lanier asked to screams of approval from the children. “With knowledge comes power, so if you read and gain knowledge you can be anything you want to be.”
Woodard encouraged the children to delve deeply into interesting subjects through daily reading.
“Reading is everything,” Woodard said. “I challenge each and every one of you to always pick something up to read. If you read 10 books on one subject you will be an expert on that subject because you will know everything there is to know about it.”
Although Middleton principal Aretha Eldridge-Williams said her school’s curriculum is geared around improving literacy among the student population, the school’s library was decimated by Hurricane Katrina and has yet to fully recover.
“Our library only opened four months ago,” Eldridge-Williams said. “We had roof and water damage and lost most of our books.”
The library serves as a central meeting place at the school and holds after school activities ranging from dance classes to drama club, Eldridge-Williams said, so its restoration will do more than just give students a place to read.
Eldridge-Williams said she is a certified reading specialist and has been focusing on reading since coming to Middleton three years ago.
“We are a literacy school,” she said. “We are a reading first school. Everything we do here starts with the foundation of reading.”
But without a library full of books, Eldridge-Williams said her 295 students have been struggling to keep up with her high reading expectations, so she decided to begin searching for a helping hand to restock the school’s empty library shelves.
“I am on the advisory board for Scholastic’s Rebuilding the Gulf Coast Committee,” Eldridge-Williams said. “I said, let’s get on the board with this and try to get some help.”
Her efforts at Scholastic Inc. resulted in a cover story in the textbook publishing giant’s monthly magazine “Choices” in January 2006.
“Once I got that story in my hands, I thought, let’s use this as much as we can to get as much as we can so I sent it to the NBA Cares people,” Eldridge-Williams said.
Almost immediately representatives of NBA Cares contacted Eldridge-Williams and set up Monday’s Reading Rally and a $5,000 donation for library books.
Eldridge-Williams said she buys her school books at wholesale prices so she will be able to purchase $9,000 worth of books with the $5,000 donation.
“We’re just so excited to be able to do this,” she said. “This couldn’t have happened at a better time. February is literacy month at Middleton and this week is literacy week, so what better way to spend it than with these wonderful and generous stars celebrating reading and their wonderful gift.”
Originally published by Stephen Maloney.
(c) 2008 The Journal : the Community News of Jefferson Parish. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.