Educators discuss literacy practices in RIF's online forums. RIF also runs six community literacy programs, including Family Readers , whose goal is to involve parents and other community members in encouraging children to read. Running Start , for first graders, operates in all Delaware elementary schools and in other areas as well. Shared Beginnings helps teen parents prepare their infants to read. The program focuses on books about food.
Several programs are under development.
Last year, RIF books reached more than four million children. Funding comes from many sources, including the U.S. Department of Education and public school PTAs. A Journal From the Trenches NEA member Bob Peterson, a fifth grade teacher in Milwaukee, started Rethinking Schools newspaper 15 years ago with an old computer and a can of rubber cement. With a circulation of 42,000 today, the paper addresses education and social justice through the eyes of classroom teachers. Some of my colleagues and I were dissatisfied with the shallow analysis of education issues in journals and the mainstream press.