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 About
Book Worm Angels:
Imagine a home with no books, where reading is not valued.
Imagine parents who'd like to help, but who have extremely
limited means. Imagine homes where adults speak no English,
and children must be teachers to their parents.
 These
and other situations combine to challenge even the most
eager children trying to master reading. In Chicago,
in over a quarter of public elementary schools, 50%
or more students read below grade level.Educators agree
that in-home reading for fun and pleasure, and reading
with a caring adult, improves reading scores and greatly
enhances literacy.
Yet many schools in Chicago's poorest neighborhoods
must use their budget for reading resources that stay
in school. Classroom books often belong to the teacher
and stay in the classroom. Even school library books
are often not permitted to go home. Public libraries
near to these neighborhoods can seem far away across
dangerous gang territories where children are not safe.
 Book
Worm Angels changes these dynamics. Book Worm Angels
targets the 125 Chicago public elementary schools where
the majority of students read below grade level. We
provide seven to ten books per child to stock in-classroom
lending libraries. Our books are meant to go home. In
fact, we require they be available for this purpose.
Book Worm Angels re-stocks schools every year with more
books. An average school with 30 classrooms receives
6,500 books to initially stock their classroom libraries
and another 1,500 books every year thereafter.
 Book
Worm Angels helps schools, organizations, businesses
and individuals throughout Chicagoland organize book
drives all year long that fuel our "supply line."
We want PreK-8 "fun" reading books, not textbooks
or books with religious themes. In seven years, we've
collected 800,000 books, 300,000 in the past year alone.
As of March, 2007, we operate in 87 Chicago public
elementary schools and serve over 51,000 children. Our
goal is to serve all 125 elementary schools where the
majority of kids read below grade level.
WomenOnCall.org and Book Worm Angels:
WomenOnCall.org has been very helpful to Book Worm
Angels as we grow. Recently, a WomenOnCall.org volunteer
who is on staff with a local chapter of a national organization
critiqued our grant-writing and provided excellent,
actionable suggestions which we're incorporating into
our future grants. Another WomenOnCall.org volunteer,
Andrea Blount, a research professional, reviewed our
current surveys and made suggestions about both the
survey itself and our methodology. She also had excellent
ideas about expanding the scope of our research to provide
better information about program effectiveness.
We are grateful to WomenOnCall.org for providing the
facility to make these matches.
About Andrea:
 Relatively
new to the Chicago area, Dr. Andrea Blount, found that
nearly all of her energy was focused on her career as
a trial consultant with a local firm, Zagnoli McEvoy
Foley LLC. Traveling all over the country, often with
little notice, made committing a block of time to a
specific organization nearly impossible for her. As
much as she enjoys her hectic career, however, Andrea
missed her roots as a Counseling Psychologist and working
as an advocate for survivors of childhood abuse and
sexual assault. She wanted to start volunteering, but
did not know where to start or even if any organizations
would be interested since she could not give a specific
time commitment. That is why she was excited to learn
about WomenOnCall.org. After becoming a member, Andrea
attended the Meet & Match in February 2007. The
Meet & Match was, for her, the perfect opportunity
to learn about a wide variety of organizations in a
quick and efficient way.
After talking with dozens of organizations, she sat
down with Michael Ban from Book Worm Angels. At first,
there was not an apparent connection but the more they
talked, Andrea realized she could help strengthen the
methods the Book Worm Angels organization used to collect
data. Better data would help the organization be more
successful in securing financial grants and promoting
its success. As a social science researcher (she has
a doctorate in psychology), Andrea had a solid background
in research methodology, questionnaire design, and data
analysis - none of which she thought would interest
a volunteer organization. Once the connection was made,
Andrea reviewed Michael's existing surveys and shared
with him several ways he could improve his data collection
to give him the information he really needed - proof
that his program works!
While Andrea is still looking for an organization that
fits within her passion of empowering women and working
with abused children, WomenOnCall.org helped her find
a way to make a connection - one organization and one
hour at a time.
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