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Running Start
 Running Start is a reading motivation program for first graders and their families. The program builds on the promise of first grade, a special time when children are excited, parents are involved, and hopes and expectations are high for a child's future success.
The Challenge
Running Start challenges first graders to read 21 books in eight to ten weeks. The Running Start challenge isn’t just for the kids: it also challenges teachers, school volunteers, and especially parents to give children a burst of ambition at a crucial stage in their development as readers. With this challenge, Running Start meets first-graders’ needs for tangible signs of achievement and encouragement from their parents, teachers, and communities.
Program Goals:
- Generate excitement about reading by immersing children in books over a concentrated period of time.
- Enhance partnerships among home, school, and community.
- Enlist and encourage parents to play active roles in their children's education, especially reading.
- Create and enrich a climate that supports reading throughout the school.
- Support teachers and offer them opportunities to work together toward shared goals.
- Engage the entire community in a positive upbeat program with demonstrated educational benefits.
- Attract positive media attention to the school and to the importance of children's education and reading.
The Rewards
Anecdotal and research evidence touts the positive effects of Running Start. Parents talk about the encouragement they felt, teachers emphasize the sense of community, and children remark on the fun and free books.
A principal investigator from the National Reading Research Center of the University of Maryland concluded that "The Running Start program is an effective model of how to make a positive impact on the literacy of young children. The success of the program in motivating children and their families to engage in reading activities has clear implications for the development of programs that link the school and the home in nurturing literacy development. Running Start has a dramatic effect on family literacy practices."
 Running Start provides books for classroom collections, a guide for coordinators, and a handbook for teachers, as well as program materials, including bookmarks, posters, stickers, and recognition items for children, parents, and volunteers who meet the challenge.
The Impact
Running Start has now reached more than 400,000 children and their parents, schools, and communities in all 50 states. Since its inception, supporters of the program have included the Chrysler Corporation Fund, S.C. Johnson Wax Fund, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Mobil Foundation, Shell Oil Company Foundation, and Reader’s Digest Foundation.
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