Dwyane Wade to Launch Live to Dream Summer Reading Program at Marquette University

In just a few weeks, the new Dwyane Wade Live to Dream Summer Reading Program at Marquette University will welcome its first class of second‑and third‑grade students from schools in Milwaukee’s most undeserved neighborhoods. Testing is now being done to identify those who would benefit most from this invaluable summer program of reading instruction. Sixty students will be transported to campus and receive two hours of tutoring five days a week for six weeks from June 15 through July 24.

The Live to Dream initiative allows more children to realize the life‑changing experience provided by Marquette’s Hartman Literacy and Learning Center, which offers one of the country’s most highly regarded reading instruction programs. Operating within the university’s College of Education, Live to Dream allows the center to extend its services to students over the summer months, helping them retain critical reading skills achieved during the school year. These gains comprise measurable results in word recognition, vocabulary, fluency and, most importantly, comprehension.

In a unique and innovative feature to increase students’ understanding of the context in which they use words, the “Wade students” will participate in a collaboration with the College of Education’s “Integrating Arts Across the Curriculum” course. Students will take photographs of the block on which they live and, using Romere Bearden’s collage called “The Block” (photo above) as a guide, will create their own collage to hang in the college’s hallway. The work will be integrated into the students’ writing instruction and result in each class creating a book that the children can keep. Students will be exposed to a unique combination of reading and writing instruction and the student and novice teachers who tutor the children will experience professional development throughout the process.

Kathleen Clark, Director of the Center and the College’s Associate Professor of Educational Policy and Leadership, says, “Children who attend the Hartman Center’s after-school reading program during the academic year make important reading gains. We are so pleased to be able to provide summer programming to the children we serve thanks to the generosity of the Wade World’s Foundation.”

To learn more about the Live to Dream Summer Reading Program and other Wade World’s Foundation initiatives visit www.wadesworldfoundation.org!