Riordan Launches Literacy Corps Drive
Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan launched his L.A. Literacy Corps during a radio broadcast Wednesday, calling on businesses to chip in both money and employee time for schools.
Under the program, employees would read to students and coach them in reading.
Four companies answered the challenge during the broadcast on KFWB-AM (980) radio, beginning with the radio station. Animation studio Klasky-Csupo, biomedical corporation MiniMed and the Southern California Institute of Architecture also pledged to adopt schools.
Riordan outlined the plan last month while on a bus tour of several Los Angeles schools. He filled in more detail Wednesday, saying that each company in the corps will donate a minimum of $5,000 a year for five years to pay for books and reading programs.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power will match that gift by building a reading garden at each adopted school.
The company will also allow its employees one hour per week to volunteer at the school as a reading partner to a child in kindergarten through third grade. Eleven other donors signed up before Riordan’s formal kickoff.
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
