Carol Olson reading for Emerson's DEAR Day 2010

On Friday, March 5th, over 150 volunteers from UC Berkeley, local businesses, churches, and neighborhood groups joined Berkeley School Volunteers and Berkeley Public Education Foundation in the Berkeley Public elementary and pre-schools for DEAR Day, or “Drop Everything and Read” Day. Conceived as a way to celebrate literacy and the birthday of the iconic children’s book author Dr. Seuss, DEAR Day aims to brings folks from our community into the schools to drop everything for one hour and share their love for books and reading with youth across the USA.

A big thank you to all who participated. Our volunteers consistently make this event a great success! If you would like to join us next year, please contact BSV with your name, email address and phone number; we will add you to our e-newsletter and keep you informed of our events and volunteer opportunities throughout the school year.

Read more about DEAR Day and see some local heroes reading to Berkeley youth here:
http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2010-03-04/article/34791?headline=Berkeley-Drops-Everything-to-Read

We are proud to announce that the City of Berkeley has recognized BPEF and its Berkeley School Volunteers annual DEAR Day — or Drop Everything and Read — event with a proclamation naming March 5, 2010 as DEAR Day in Berkeley! Over 135 volunteers, including Mayor Bates, all City Council members, our new Chief of Police Michael Meehan, and BUSD Superintendent Huyett will join community members at each of our 11 K-5 schools to read a favorite book or two. Thank you to them and all the volunteers who are so important to the vitality of our schools and make this day a success. Click to view the proclamation DEAR Day proclamation!.