America Reads volunteers are involved in service activities that play key roles in working with individual children, supporting classroom activities, supporting families, and serving as catalysts and organizers of community-level reading initiatives. Their activities provide a direct benefit to children that is valued by the school or community-based organization. Activities that do not provide a direct benefit to children, such as curriculum development or research on reading, are only considered as an America Reads program if they are in support of activities that provide direct benefits. Quality America Reads programs include activities and mechanisms that provide for the involvement of families, parents or guardians. Quality America Reads programs incorporate intentional and appropriate adaptation of proven effective practices that address the specific needs of the child, the school and the community and that reflect the resources available to the program.
School districts have policies and procedures for involving students in enrichment activities.
Volunteer tutor screenings and parental consent forms are often among the requirements to operate volunteer tutoring programs. Project staff ensure full compliance with all regulations governing their programs. In addition, projects are strongly encouraged to adhere to nationally accepted standards for quality regarding the care of a child that are published by organizations such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children and the National School-Age Care Alliance. Use of research-based elements to produce reading achievement. With a plethora of current research materials on the effectiveness of volunteer tutoring programs, project staff no longer have to start from scratch when designing and implementing tutoring activities.