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Duval County Summer Reading Initiative

What is the Reading Initiative?  The Duval County Summer Reading Initiative is a project under the Federal Student Support and Academic Enrichment - Title IV, Part A grant project.  Students have an opportunity to select books of high interest to them for summer enrichment.  This project is a collaboration between READ USA and the district to prevent the "summer slide".

To support parents and students over the summer, parent resources are provided during the bookfair, virtual courses are provided, strategy recordings are available, along with parent "reading tips" via phone, email, and text.  In addition to this site, please visit for additional resources that will be provided.

What is the Summer Slide? The Summer Slide is something all parents and educators should be concerned about as it is the tendency for students to lose some of the achievement gains they made during the previous school year. 

Live virtual training dates: June 4, June 6, June 11, June 13 and June 18.  As live sessions are provided, recordings will be posted for parents.

• • • Prediction and Inference: This 30-minute training will provide parents with hints on helping their children make predictions and inferences when reading a text.  After the session, parents are welcome to stay on the virtual training for individual questions. 
      Summer training date and registration: June 4, 2024, from 6:00 - 6:30 pm. Click to register for this session.
    • Making Connections and Phonics/Decoding:  This 30-minute training will provide parents with hints on helping their children make connections between what is read and the world around them, as well as strategies for improving their decoding skills.  After the session, parents are welcome to stay on the virtual training for individual questions.   
      Summer training date and registration: June 6, 2024, from 4:30 - 5:00 pm. Click to register for this session.
    • Questioning and Visualizing:  This 30-minute training will provide parents with ways to question their child while reading and also ways to incorporate visualizing to improve comprehension.  After the session, parents are welcome to stay on the virtual training for individual questions.
      Summer training date and registration: June 11, 2024, from 11:30 - 12:00 pm.  Click to register for this session.
    • Summarizing and Evaluating:  This 30-minute session focuses on helping children to summarize what has been read as well as evaluating the text.  After the session, parents are welcome to stay on the virtual training for individual questions.   
      Summer training date and registration: June 13, 2024, from 4:30 - 5:00 pm. Click to register for this session.
    • Fix Up Strategies -  This 30-minute session focuses on helping provide parents with strategies they can use to help their child troubleshoot any misunderstandings as they read.  After the session, parents are welcome to stay on the virtual training for individual questions.   
      Summer training date and registration:  June 18, 2024, from 6:00 - 6:30 pm. Click to register for this session.

Summer Lunch and Learn: Join us June 26, 2024 from 10:00 a.m.until 1:00 p.m. at The Schultz Center, 4019 Boulevard Center Dr, Jacksonville, FL 32207. Please check back here for additional information.

How can I participate?  Parents, if your child is in an elementary grade level PreK – 5, he/she was able to visit the bookfair at his/her school and selected two books of interest.  Guess what? There wasn't a cost for students for the books.  Parents will need to be on the lookout for books to incorporate reading strategies at home and encourage the love of reading.  If your child was not in attendance on the day of the bookfair, his/her teacher selected books for them.   

Partnership:  Duval County Public Schools is implementing this project in partnership with READ USA, Inc. READ USA believes in the inherent talent of every child.  Through reading and writing comes advanced knowledge and the opportunity to actualize their full potential. With this project, READ USA will leverage business and community partners to match the payment for student books.