• Volunteer
• Give
• Advocate

School Readiness

Research tells us that children who start school lacking basic skills have tremendous difficulty catching up,and are at greater risk for eventual school dropout. One key to helping children and youth stay in school and earn a high school diploma is to ensure that they are prepared to be successful academically when they start school. Quality early education experiences increase the likelihood that a child will begin school prepared to be successful.

TUW coordinates a number of programs and initiatives designed to support children and families in developing school readiness, focusing on building early literacy skills and quality early childhood education, including:

Born Learning
Born Learning is a campaign designed to help parents recognize and understand the stages of their child's development. Developmental stages are identified by chronological age ranges, and easy-to-read flyers highlight common issues related to health, growth and development, safety, and nurturing.

Born to Read
Born to Read is a collaborative partnership between TUW, the Charleston County Public Library, the Friends of the Library, and the Medical University of South Carolina. The goal of this partnership is to provide parents of newborns at MUSC with information on the importance of early literacy to stimulate and support parents' efforts to read with their children.

Raising A Reader
TUW is the community affiliate for Raising A Reader, a program that works with 3- and 4-year-olds and their families to encourage interactive literacy. Children get to take home award-winning books weekly, and parents are offered training in engaging their children in reading.

Countdown to Kindergarten

Child Care Resource & Referral
The Child Care Resource & Referral (CCR&R) program seeks to increase access to, and increase the availability of, quality child care for all parents. CCR&R staff work closely with child care providers to offer training and technical assistance to improve the quality of child care, and work with parents/caregivers to locate accessible, high quality child care.

Links to Other Parenting Websites
To support our efforts to build school readiness, TUW is pleased to offer Read Aloud Guides for families with young children, birth through school entry. The guide includes strategies and techniques for developing and strengthening home literacy routines, information on literacy development stages, and methods for helping children become better readers.