Twice a week this summer, tutors from the Reading Clinic at Eastern Oregon University have been coming to the Clubhouse in La Grande to read with our kids. Here's what that looks like.

The Clubhouse sits on the second floor of First Presbyterian Church on Washington Avenue. Most summer mornings it is loud. Legos, snacks, kids arguing about what happens after lunch.

Twice a week, it gets quiet. Tables spread out. Each kid sits down across from a tutor, and for a stretch of the morning, they read.

Who the tutors are

They are graduate students at Eastern Oregon University working toward their master's in education. Every one of them is headed for a classroom of their own. Every one of them is giving us their time during the summer.

What the Reading Clinic does

The Reading Clinic at Eastern Oregon University is a nonprofit that works to improve reading for students across eastern Oregon, with families and caregivers at the center of it. It trains the region's teachers in structured literacy, the approach with the strongest research behind it for kids who find reading hard, and it provides free tutoring to children who are striving readers. Families and school districts pay nothing.

Why this age

Our kids are five, six, and seven. In a few weeks they head back to classrooms in Imbler, Union, and La Grande. This is the age when reading takes hold.

In a rural county, the people who do this work well are few and their schedules are full. What the Reading Clinic brings to the Clubhouse is real reading instruction, free, in a room where our kids already know everybody.

That last part matters more than it sounds. Reading out loud in front of someone is a risk, and kids take risks in rooms where they feel safe. Their Friend (their paid, professional mentor) is in the building. The snacks are the same snacks. The tutor is someone they will see again on Thursday.

Thank you to the EOU Reading Clinic for a summer we could not have put together on our own.

We ran into EOU more than once this summer

When our kids walked the Stock Show Parade, the Eastern Oregon University football team walked the route with them, along with players from the softball and volleyball teams. They kept the group together and had a hand ready when the crowd got loud. For a five-year-old, a parade crowd is a lot. It gets easier when a college athlete is walking beside you.

Thank you to EOU football, volleyball, and softball for helping us wrangle the littles and for being exactly the kind of people our kids should be looking up to.

What comes next

The Reading Clinic is staying with us this school year. Starting in October, families in our program are invited to a book club and dinner at Cook Memorial Library, brothers and sisters too, and starting in December, the Reading Clinic will train our Friends every month. Read what's next.

We're in our second year in Union County. Our Friends will be with these kids for 12+ years, no matter what, through every grade in Imbler, Union, and La Grande and everything after. This summer, EOU helped make sure the reading part started on time.

Gifts from right here in Union County keep a Friend beside each of these children every week.