Summer Power Read has wrapped up at Western Hills in West Des Moines and is ending later this month at Maple Grove in Waukee and Walnut Street School in Des Moines. The Power Readers have enjoyed reading with their mentors this summer, and many mentors are looking forward to returning to our programs this fall. We’re always seeking mentors to match with students, so if you’re interested in reading, please email Anna Sunstrom, and refer your friends, as well.

We've been having a great time together at our summer Power Read programs!

Want to earn some green and serve as a site coordinator? Please click here to view employment opportunities or contact program manager Stacy Pearce.

We’re coordinating with our communities to distribute books at summer meal sites, and we still need some volunteer support. Are you able to take a shift and share the love about Power Read? Email Anna for information and availability.

June marked the end of our 2023 fiscal year and we’re working on our annual report. Keep an eye out for that in an upcoming issue. In the meantime, we’re seeking monthly Power Read student sponsors for fiscal year 2024. It only costs $42 each month to sponsor a student for the school year. Click here to learn more.

Before the school year ended, we asked some of our teachers about their students and Power Read. Here’s what they had to say:

"He is a student who needs positive adult figures in his life. He benefits from that direct, personal connection that programs like this encourage. He very much looked forward to the Power Read every week."

"She shows a lot of confidence in her ability to do well in reading! She is excited to read and get better at reading!"

"He is much more confident in his reading and is tackling more complex books."

"She is showing more confidence in her reading since the start of the program. She began the year very quiet and didn't often speak up. Now, she is always one of the first in our class to raise her hand and communicate her ideas."

EWI executive director Karen Ligas was named the Citizen of the Year by the Des Moines Downtown Chamber of Commerce at their annual dinner on June 7. EWI was also honored to be nominated for the Nonprofit of the Year Award. Congratulations to Karen as well as nonprofit winner Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Iowa.

Rachel Simon, who serves on the EWI Board of Directors, is reading "Then She Was Gone" by Lisa Jewell.

EWI site coordinator Ashley Harvey is reading “Cherish” (Crave Book 6) by Tracy Wolff.

Gina Ruggle is reading “The Last Thing He Told Me” by Laura Dave.

School Subject

Graham Jones, Maple Grove Elementary School principal

Graham Jones was a fan of Power Read from his days at Hillside Elementary School in West Des Moines. “When I transitioned to Waukee and became principal at Maple Grove, I asked about Power Read and presented it to some of my teachers and they were over the moon,” he says. This summer the program debuted in the Waukee Community School District at Jones’s Maple Grove Elementary, and it’s slated to continue there in the upcoming school year. “Any opportunity to extend what’s going on in the classroom, I see that as a positive,” Graham says. “And we all know that kids like individual attention. We talk about how relationships are the most important thing in how we support kids. The academic part comes after the relationship.” Power Read, he observes, does all of that with the foundation of books. “The mentors share their love of reading and help students find books they connect with,” Graham says.

Director Details

Morgan Schultz, Special Events Committee co-chair

Morgan Schultz has only been on the EWI Board of Directors for a year, but she says she already believes the organization’s future is bright. “Whenever I represent Everybody Wins! Iowa at an event and people who are familiar with us see our name, they light up,” she says. “There are enduring challenges for small organizations like ours, including public awareness and fundraising, but on our board of directors new ideas are always bubbling up.” Morgan says it’s a passion for childhood literacy and a love of books that drew her to EWI. “I’m an only child, so some of my earliest friends were my books. I was an early reader and I learned early on to fall in love with books,” she says. “I was always reading two or three books at a time, and now I can bring my love of books to more children.”

Here’s a sweet deal! During the entire month of August, stop by Crème to buy The Bookworm, a signature cupcake that benefits Everybody Wins! Iowa. A dollar from each Bookworm cupcake from this local bakery will be donated to EWI. The Bookworm is chocolate cake with vanilla mousse, cream cheese frosting, crushed Oreos, and a gummy worm. Crème is located at 548 28th St. in Des Moines.

EWI will have volunteers at National Night Out events throughout the Des Moines metro area on August 1. Click here to see the locations where we'll be chatting about Power Read and distributing books to children.

Follow us on social media (links at the top and bottom of this email), visit our website, and look for updates in future newsletters for more details on these and future events.

The cost to sponsor a Power Read student for the entire school year is just $42 each month. Please click here to support young readers in Central Iowa.

We are always grateful for the support of all our program sponsors. Our June donors include: 

$4,166.67

United Way of Central Iowa (Power Read monthly grant)

$1,000.00 - Bankers Trust

$500.00 - Gaye Wiekierak

$100.00 - Angela Gibbons

$500.00 - GuideOne Foundation

$125.00 - Valerie Gramlich

Want to donate? Click here.

Interested in mentoring, joining the board, or serving on a committee? Click here.

Have an idea or suggestion for Power Read, Everybody Wins! Iowa, or The Bookworm? Click here.

Everybody Wins! Iowa is a central Iowa non-profit organization whose mission is to increase children’s success in school and life through one-to-one reading and mentoring experiences with caring volunteers. Our signature program is Power Read, in which students read with the same volunteer mentor every week, usually over lunch. Please click here for current data on mentors, students, and books distributed.