Colorado Classroom Project Expands Access to Literacy Instruction

By Rebecca Holmes, CEI President and CEO

I wanted to break our regular cycle of end-of-month newsletters to share some really important news with you. 

As a parent of younger children, I’ve experienced first-hand the challenges this pandemic has put into the hands of parents in Colorado. I realize that the promise of virtual learning is far from the same when addressing the needs for a middle-schooler or high-schooler (who have a different set of challenges). How do you still do your full-time job while ensuring your kids are getting an education? How do you work as a household to ensure the instruction your kids get is leveled appropriately but also challenging them?  And for too many families, the basic opportunity of internet access is not a reality, creating real barriers to ensuring equity of access for all families.

That’s why I’m so excited to announce this week that CEI has partnered with the Governor’s Office, Rocky Mountain PBS, the Colorado Department of Education, Colorado Education Association, and many others to launch Colorado Classroom: Read with Me at Home. Thanks to the generous support of Gary Community Investments, this K-3 programming will be broadcast daily on PBS for the next five weeks, and families of young children across the state will have access to some of the best teachers Colorado has to offer. Learn more about this important initiative, the partners who’ve worked together to make it happen over the past month.

Please share this news widely with your community. We are hopeful that many families and their K-3 students will take full advantage of this important resource as the school year concludes and we enter the summer months.