BATON ROUGE - Thanks to funding from the Louisiana Department of Education, a volunteer group will receive additional training to help keep kids on track with their reading skills. 

Volunteers in Public Schools is a local nonprofit that pairs up Reading Friends with students struggling to keep up with their literacy. Last school year, VIP helped 500 students by pairing them with volunteers and helping them with phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. 

Through a new funding effort from the LDE, volunteers with VIPS will be trained in scientifically-based research on how children learn to read and write through the Science of Reading under a consulting firm. 

"Although our Reading Friends work in tandem with classroom teachers, we are always excited when our volunteers have the opportunity to receive additional training. We recognize that the district included research from the Reading Rope in its Blueprint for Literacy so we are appreciative to LDE that allows us to better coordinate our services with the priorities set by the district to have students reading on grade level," stated Judy K. Bethly, VIPS executive director.

For information on how to volunteer with VIPS, visit their website here.