Storywise: Building Brighter Futures Near And Far

Swagelok Northern California is a great place to work, and we are trying to make a difference in our community through Storywise, but we never forget that we are here because of our customers, so we strive every day to be our customer's favorite story. Learn more »

By helping children learn to read, we set them on a course for richer lives

You are using an amazing skill right now, one that is essential to a successful life: You can read.

Someone who can't read, or who reads poorly, faces a huge hurdle in navigating our modern society, let alone thriving in it. The ability to read well means academic success, economic security, better access to health care, and participation in civic life.

Literacy is not something to take for granted. The inability to read well is a huge problem in this country. In fact, 32 million adults in the United States can't read this article.

We know that 85 percent of all young people who end up in the juvenile court system are functionally illiterate. Over 70 percent of inmates in America's prisons cannot read above the fourth-grade level. And 75 percent of Americans who receive food stamps perform at the lowest two levels of literacy.

Storywise at Swagelok Northern California

An effort to combat the problem of low literacy got underway this past year. A small group of sales and service locations, including Swagelok Northern California, decided to help children and to coordinate their efforts under the banner of Storywise. Storywise, in various locations, provides local funding and volunteers to make measurable differences in the lives of tens of thousands of children around the world.

In addition to coordinating with a number of other sales and service locations, what is unique about Storywise, is that we engage customers in the process as well. Being able to work side-by-side with customers offers a great way to get to know them better. Ultimately, that will make it easier to serve them better. It's a win-win-win for the associates, the customers and, most importantly of all, the kids. What could be better than helping children while developing deeper relationships with your customers?

After a great deal of research locally, Swagelok Northern California found three organizations with missions that complemented one another and were aligned with the goals of Storywise. Under the banner of "Building Brighter Futures," Storywise donates funds and inspires its associates to volunteer to support these three local charitable organizations.

Reading Partners

Reading Partners, a national nonprofit group is dedicated to improving the reading skills of students in the 1st through 4th grades. It recruits and trains community volunteers to work in elementary schools supporting students from low-income communities who are reading below grade-level. The volunteers work one-on-one with students for 45 minutes twice a week.

In the past year, Swagelok Northern California Associates have volunteered as “Reading Partners” for a total exceeding 100 hours. Reading Partners provides an easy to follow curriculum which includes focused lessons on fluency, reading comprehension, reading strategies and read aloud time for both the child and tutor. The work is heartwarming and fulfilling. From a funding standpoint, Storywise has made possible a new Reading Center at a local title one school about 10 miles away from our Fremont headquarters.

Reading Recovery

Reading Recovery is a short-term program for first graders having extreme difficulty with early reading and writing. Specially trained and certified teachers work individually with students in daily 30-minute lessons lasting 20 weeks. After a full series of lessons, an impressive 75 percent of these formerly lowest performing students reach grade-level standard.

Storywise is supporting Reading Recovery by providing funds for new teachers to be certified in the Reading Recovery Program. To date, Storywise has provided the funding for two teachers to go through the extensive certification program as well as one Teacher Trainer who will be able to train and support many additional Reading Recovery teachers in the future.

Raising A Reader

Based in Redwood City, Raising A Reader helps families develop, practice and maintain home-based literacy routines for their children up to 8 years old. Raising A Reader teaches parents how to work with their own kids, encouraging time to cuddle up and explore books together. Through a network of school systems, libraries, community agencies and other community partners across 34 states, this group reaches more than 130,000 children and families each year.

Storywise is currently supporting Raising A Reader programs in 20 kindergarten classrooms throughout Fremont. This effort gives nearly 500 children the opportunity to take 3 books home each week to share with their families. The books are toted home each Monday in a little red Storywise branded book bag then brought back and exchanged for a new book bag (with three new books) the following week. In a typical 36 week school year, each child will have brought more than 100 books home to share with their families.

Swagelok Northern California Associates recently stayed after work and helped Raising A Reader fill nearly 300 book bags with books. The bags were sorted, packed and sent off to new local Raising A Reader classrooms.

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