After just four months of instruction, the Boys & Girls Club of the Hatchie River Region says its new reading program is already showing measurable gains for students across multiple grade levels.
The Reading Success Academy, launched in August in partnership with Ford Motor Company and Tipton County Public Schools, provides small-group and one-on-one instruction aimed at strengthening foundational reading skills for students in kindergarten through eighth grade.
The program is led by educators Kelli Cousar and Sarah Dunavant, who each bring more than 20 years of classroom experience.
Using the Aimsweb Plus assessment tool, the program tracked student progress from August through December 2025.
Among younger students, 40 percent of kindergarteners improved in letter name fluency, while 20 percent of first graders showed growth in word reading fluency. In second grade, 23 percent improved in oral reading fluency.
For students in grades 3–8, the percentage reading at or above the 50th percentile increased from 28 percent to 30 percent, and 55 percent showed measurable growth in oral reading fluency. Among students identified as high priority – those reading two or more years below grade level – 52 percent improved their overall reading composite score.
CEO Ed Doyle said the results reflect a limited window of instruction.
“What makes these results even more remarkable is that our club kids achieved this success in such a short period of time,” Doyle said. “This data only shows about four months of instruction, because Kelli and Sarah devoted quite a bit of time to their initial and follow-up assessments.”
Doyle said students have faced significant disruptions in recent years, including the COVID-19 pandemic and an EF-3 tornado that destroyed Crestview Elementary and Crestview Middle School, now Covington Elementary and Covington Middle.
The program, which began with grades 3–5, has since expanded to serve about 110 students. That includes roughly 50 kindergarten through second-grade students each week and about 60 students in grades 3–8 daily.
Instruction for younger students focuses on phonemic awareness, letter recognition and fluency. Older students work on multi-syllabic decoding, vocabulary and comprehension strategies.
Doyle credited the program’s growth to its partnerships.
“These results reflect the power of collaboration between education, community, and corporate partners,” he said. “Their help and support allow us to ensure that more students are not only reading but reading at or above grade level and beyond.”
The club said it will continue tracking student progress through the remainder of the school year.
