GREAT FALLS — A rural Montana school is taking a creative approach to boosting literacy by shopping for personalized books that students can take home and keep forever.
The Dutton-Brady School received a $1 million grant from the Office of Public Instruction's "Montana Reads" program, with $400,000 arriving this year alone.
The funding will be distributed over five years to support literacy initiatives throughout the small school district.
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But it's how educators are using part of that money that makes their approach special. The school created a unique program called "literacy backpacks" that puts carefully selected books directly into students' homes.
Program Coordinator Lisette Hofer and other educators recently visited Barnes & Noble in Great Falls to buy two books for each of the school's 120 students, ranging in age from zero to 18. Each book is tailored to individual students' interests and reading levels.
"We are tailoring each book specific to each student," Hofer said. "My coworkers all have a list of students in the grade levels that they're going for. And then when they find a specific book that they want for their student, they're going to write their name on a sticky note."
The books will be delivered to students in backpacks embroidered with their school's name, along with a journal. The personalized approach is possible because of the school's small size, which allows educators to know each student individually.
Superintendent Jeremy Locke said the grant allows them to extend literacy support beyond the classroom walls.
"That's one of the things that when we pushed to write this grant, we knew that we wanted to take a portion of that grant money and put it directly into our community homes and our families so that they have support not only to be able to read with their children every day and every night, but also have the materials for that as well," Locke said.
The school plans to surprise students with their personalized backpacks before Christmas break. Hofer hopes this initiative will help students feel less overwhelmed when choosing books to read.
"It's a little overwhelming. They might not know where to start, but if they read that book of an interest, come to the library for the next book or for more, it'll just get them reading and comfortable with literacy. Comfortable with books, comfortable with all of it," Hofer said.
Locke said the ultimate goal is to encourage lifelong reading habits among students.
"We want to make sure that we are targeting what kids' interests are so that they really get involved and become a lifelong reader, because that's really what our ultimate goal is," Locke said. "We want lifelong learners and lifelong readers. And the best way we can do that is to pique their interest."
The remaining grant money will fund professional development, curriculum updates, and library improvements over the next four years.
Dutton-Brady educators say this personalized book initiative is just the beginning of their push to build strong readers in their rural community.
This broadcast news story has been lightly edited for online publication with the assistance of AI for clarity, syntax, and grammar.
