PORTLAND, Ore. — Portland’s Vestal and Boise-Eliot elementary schools are reaping the benefits of a reading intervention program funded by the PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning’s Pacific Power Fund. The program, Project Optimize, is helping teachers rescue children who arrive at kindergarten unprepared to learn how to read.

“Project Optimize is making a real difference in children’s lives,” said Susan Foxman, principal at Northeast Portland’s Vestal Elementary. “Children who might have been referred to special education classes can be helped instead through this intensive, highly successful intervention.”

The program targets kindergartners most in need of help in terms of reading readiness.
The most recent study showed that more than 70 percent of the Project Optimize participants in Oregon have made significant improvements in reading readiness. With nearly two years of implementation at Vestal and Boise Elliott, Project Optimize is proving it can make a difference.

“Our first-grade teachers are elated with the program because their students came into this school year better prepared,” said James Brannon, principal at North Portland’s Boise-Eliot Elementary. “At the beginning of this year, the first- and second-grade teachers gave commendations to the kindergarten teachers for doing such a good job.”

“Eighty-five percent of the kids arriving in kindergarten were not targeted for reading success,” Foxman said. “Some didn’t have a preschool program that included a reading-readiness component. Other children are immigrants where English isn’t spoken in the home.  It was clear to us through testing which students needed intervention.”

The program provides a workbook with different activities for the students. The activities include listening to and identifying sounds, and writing letters. When the kids arrive in first grade, students should be familiar with the concepts of blending sounds in preparation for reading.

Created by University of Oregon researchers, Project Optimize lessons provide phonologic and alphabetic instruction that prepares kindergartners to be successful beginning readers. The program complements the Start Making a Reader Today (SMART) reading program to provide reading support.

The program began last year after receiving funding by the PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning’s Pacific Power Fund. Vestal has 20 children in Project Optimize. Boise-Eliot is serving 71 kindergarten, 19 first grade, and four special education children with the program. The two schools are among six Oregon elementary schools to test the program. Foundation-funded literacy programs are now impacting 3,000 kids across Oregon, Utah, Wyoming and Idaho.

“Our interest in Project Optimize is one part of our overall commitment to early childhood literacy,” said Isaac Regenstreif, PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning’s executive director. “First grade teachers are saying that they’ve never seen students better prepared, and the numbers at schools bear that out.”

“The program’s success has made converts of the tutors, those who work with the kids 30 min. daily,” Foxman said. “They are passionate about using Project Optimize because they see how it brings kids up to the reading benchmark — to where they should be in kindergarten.”

Foxman explained that even the best teachers can’t reach the all students using a core reading program alone. “It’s necessary to supplement with intervention for kids who arrive at kindergarten unprepared,” she said.

There is a population of students who require a double-dose of phonological awareness and blending sounds in order to become confident readers, and later pass the first reading benchmark at third grade.

At Vestal, about 30 percent of the students come from homes where English is not the first language. These languages include Indochinese, African dialects, Spanish, and 20 other tongues. “Learning English can be especially difficult for some children because it has sounds they aren’t hearing in their native languages,” she said.

Another benefit to Project Optimize is that it doesn’t remove children from their class. The 30 minutes each day that PacifiCorp funds comes either before or after school. Students can stay with their classmates for their normal courses, and then they have their extra dose of reading instruction

Even principals roll up their sleeves to keep reading intervention a priority in the face of serious budget cuts. “We don’t have any extra resources,” Brannon said. “At the end of the year last year, we had to cut seven educational assistants. I teach a reading class, our assistant principal teaches one. When the cuts came, we’ve found a way to make up for it.”

To date, it’s been worthwhile.

“We’re feeling good about where we are,” Brannon said. “We just conducted a series of standardized tests. In looking at the Kindergarten students that are exposed to Optimize, 85 percent of those students are on target to reach benchmark by the end of the school year.  In addition, four of those students have Special Ed. identification.”

Molly Chun is Boise-Eliot’s reading specialist with 24 years of teaching experience. “It’s very sustainable,” she said. “The classroom teachers are trained, so even if there are cuts, we’ve worked hard to make Project Optimize budget-cut proof. That’s something you have to do these days.”

Project Optimize is one of three programs in the Foundation’s first learning initiative receiving $1 million over three years to improve early childhood literacy rates in communities served by PacifiCorp companies, Pacific Power and Utah Power. Project Optimize is receiving $300,000 over three years. PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning support expanded Project Optimize into six Oregon schools.

Selected Project Optimize schools:
• Boise-Eliot Elementary, Portland
• Vestal Elementary, Portland
• Little Butte, Eagle Point
• Metolious, Madras
• Parkside, Grants Pass
• Warm Springs Elementary, Warm Springs

About The PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning

The PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning works with local school districts through a number of different initiatives, totaling more than $200,000 in donations. These include Project Optimize, a literacy program for kindergarten-age children, and support of Self-Enhancement Inc., Project Learn at Boys & Girls Clubs, and the SMART reading program. The Foundation is one of the largest utility-endowed foundations in the United States. It is an independent foundation advancing individual and community aspirations through learning. Since the Foundation was established in 1988, it has awarded nearly 6,000 grants totaling more than $35 million to communities served by Utah Power, Pacific Power and PacifiCorp. The Foundation has also established a permanent endowment, recently valued at more than $38.5 million. In general, grants from the Foundation are limited to charitable nonprofit, tax-exempt organizations. The Foundation awards grants for requests in four categories: civic and community betterment, arts and culture, health and human services, and education The PacifiCorp Foundation for Learning is headed by Isaac Regenstreif, executive director.

Media inquiries: newsdesk@pacificorp.com