SALISBURY  — In an effort to maintain school year literacy gains by Head Start pre-school students, the Salisbury-Rowan Community Action Agency (SRCAA) is partnering with ApSeed Early Childhood Education to have ApSeed’s literacy education tablets issued to participants in SRCAA’s 2018 Pre-School Summer Care Program. Participants in the SRCAA summer program will receive the “Seedling” tablet free of charge. SRCAA’s Summer Care Program is now available for all area children between the ages of 3 to 5 (a child does not have to be an existing Head Start student). The program currently runs through Aug. 10.

ApSeed staff will be available to advise parents of participants on how to best utilize the Seedling during this summer’s program. Summer participants will be utilizing the Seedling under instruction of SRCAA’s trained pre-school instructors with the goal of not just maintaining but boosting literacy rates. Because children do not have to be Head Start students to attend the SRCAA Summer Care program, many children that don’t regularly get quality pre-school education can get intensive literacy training through repetitive use of the Seedling during the SRCAA summer program.

ApSeed has partnered with SRCAA’s Head Start program to pursue the goal of getting all of Rowan County’s students at grade level reading by the third grade. In early 2017, ApSeed began issuing the custom made Seedlings to SRCAA’s Head Start programs and training SRCAA teachers about the devices. So far, the results have been quite positive. Both parties are analyzing data regarding the children’s progress for future publication, but anecdotal reviews by parents have shown students graduating to kindergarten from Head Start showcasing grade level reading abilities.

Greg Alcorn, founder of ApSeed stated, ‘It’s a wonderful opportunity for us to continue our partnership with Community Action and continue providing our Seedlings to their summer participants.”

Parents that are interested in enrolling their pre-school-aged child for the SRCAA summer program (which includes access to a free Seedling provided by ApSeed) should contact Tonya Crawford at 704-216-2467 or attonyacrawford@srcaa.com.