Steamboat Pilot & Today

It may take a village to raise a child, but in this day and age, it takes money to educate them.
So we applaud Hayden Valley Schools for going out and securing yet another grant that the community has received.
This time, Valley School got a grant that will mean $37,000 over the next 18 months for programs and teacher training.
And Michael Luppes, principal of the school, said he is hoping additional funding, totaling $42,000, will continue for two more years.
The school, Luppes said, hopes to target second- and third-grade students who are having a hard time developing reading skills.
The money also will go to help Spanish-speaking students who also are struggling with reading.
Luppes said he hopes to pay for a wide range of programs that include a tutoring program, an English language learner instructor, a student mentoring program and a reading academy.
Luppes is planning to pay teachers $20 per hour for three hours of tutoring a week. That program is to last for 36 weeks during the school year.
The grant also will fund an eight-week summer tutoring program. The program calls for tutors who will be available for two hours three days a week this summer.
"Hopefully, the money will give the teachers an incentive to give that extra help," he said.
A community should feel obligated to help those who are struggling with reading.
Reading, arguably, is not only the basics on which all other subjects can be learned but its a survival skill in today's society.
If you do not know how to read and read well you will not go far and you will miss out on one of the pleasures so many of us take for granted.
So while we congratulate the elementary school in Hayden for pushing itself to better itself, we also see this the perfect time to make a call to arms.
Illiteracy has always been a rather ugly skeleton in the closet of so many communities in this country.
But with the right resources, it doesn't have to be that way.
We commend those teachers, those who volunteer in our schools, and the parents who make the time to read with the children.
Reading is the right thing to do