The Fort Worth Independent School District is celebrating its championship in a program set up by the NCAA as the 2024 competition gets started. Students in Fort Worth ISD read the most minutes in last year's "Readers Become Leaders" championship.
Fort Worth ISD works with the Fort Worth Sports Commission and NCAA on the event. Over the past five years, they say students have logged more than 100 million minutes of reading.
In the 2023 competition, 38,636 students read a total of 71,306,182 minutes over the ten week program.
"This sets you up with a foundation of success, especially with all the other things you're having to do at school," Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker told students at M.H. Moore Elementary.
Students asked Parker several questions including one who asked how Parker's job involves reading.
"I couldn't function if I couldn't read. I was just reading the council agenda this morning," Parker answered.
"We know reading is the building block of everything we do," Fort Worth ISD Associate Superintendent Gracie Guerrero said.
To spark kids' interest in reading, TCU athletes from several sports and several members of the Professional Bull Riders' Texas Rattlers read with kids at Moore Elementary.
"I've always been an avid reader, grew up an avid reader," TCU football coach Sonny Dykes said. "That's what I talk with these kids about. You get to see the world from a different perspective."
Dykes said he hoped events like Monday's can spark a life-long interest in reading when kids are young.
"A big part of our job as leaders is to encourage and to inspire," he said. "When you're young, you might look at reading as a chore. Instead, it's a tremendous opportunity."
Asked what he likes to read, Dykes said he likes true crime stories, the fiction of John Grisham and non-fiction dealing with football and leadership.
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