wits summer books
WITS Summer Books is an initiative that brings the WITS community together to raise funds that provide books for students' at-home libraries, teachers' classroom libraries, and the WITS program library. Teams of WITS supporters unite to raise money for a Chicago elementary school.
Join a team today and be part of fostering a love of reading for Chicago students!
Functioning libraries are found in only 18% of Chicago public elementary schools. Librarians are found in just 10% of classrooms in primarily Black schools and 21% in Latinx schools.
Sixty-one percent of low-income families have no age-appropriate children’s books at home. In a school district where 71% of students are from low-income families, Chicago Public Schools (CPS) students need books for their home libraries.
According to data from The Illinois Assessment of Readiness (IAR), based on testing from Spring 2024, only 31% of elementary school students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) are proficient in reading.
By the end of the school year, 71% of WITS students had met or exceeded the national standard for reading level proficiency in their grade level, compared to 39% at the beginning of the school year.
Seventy-five percent of WITS Kindergarten teachers reported that their students had developed specialized reading interests throughout the year, an increase of more than 30% from the beginning of the year.
Eighty-four percent of WITS students reported that they liked reading books for fun at the end of the school year, up from 68% at the beginning of the school year.
At the end of the school year, an average of 90% of WITS students reported feeling good or very good about spending time with their mentors.
Make a donation
For check donations, please make payable to WITS and send to the following address: Working in the Schools: 150 N Wacker Dr Ste 1120 Chicago, IL 60606
