Ten years ago, a group of Dowagiac Union Schools educators dreamed of a way to help young students, struggling to keep up with their peers’ reading skills, to get back on pace and unlock their unlimited potential.

Thanks to the efforts of several dozen teachers, that dream has grown into a reality — a reality that has touched the lives of hundreds of Dowagiac children.

Dowagiac Union Schools’ Katrina Daiga shared the successes that the district’s Reading Recovery program has experienced over the past decade during her presentation to the board of education Monday night at Dowagiac Middle School. The coordinator discussed the history of the reading intervention program and how it has improved the education of more than 400 students — a number of whom were in the audience that evening, to the applause of parents and educators in the crowd.

Reading Recovery, a national program founded in 1984, is designed to improve the reading skills of elementary students who are at risk of not reading at grade level, Daiga said. Students who are enrolled in the program work on their math and writing skills in short, one-on-one sessions with a specially trained teacher daily over a period of 12 to 20 weeks — or about 50 hours in total — in order to bring their reading proficiency back on pace with their classmates.

“Being a student in Reading Recovery takes a lot of dedication and power,” Daiga said. “It is so intense. They read, write and do letter work all in 30 minutes. To orchestrate that, to help kids grow, are great teachers that have come to take an additional workload.”

Reading Recovery was introduced to the Dowagiac district in 2008, when Kincheloe Elementary — led at the time by Principal Dawn Conner, now the deputy superintendent in the district —trained one of its teachers to mentor a group of eight students. In the years that followed, the program has expanded to all four Union Schools elementary buildings, with both classroom teachers and dedicated instructors leading students.

A total of 417 students across all four schools have benefitted from Reading Recovery instruction over the years, Daiga said.

Daiga said that data shows that students who participate in Reading Recovery tend to make tremendous strides in their reading prowess. In fact, at the end of their stint in the program, the average Reading Recovery student actually read at a slightly higher level than their classmates.

“It’s amazing how much growth we have in such a small amount of time,” Daiga said.

Dowagiac Union Schools is just one of 26 districts that have the program in Michigan, which Daiga said is a testament to the amount of dedication local administrators and teachers have poured into making it work.

Among those diligent administrators was Conner, who Daiga thanked for taking the leap and starting Reading Recovery at Kincheloe so many years ago. Daiga announced that Conner — who is also the site coordinator for the program — will be receiving an award from the Reading Recovery Council of Michigan, during a ceremony in Troy on Nov. 16.

“It’s all about kids,” Conner said about her award. “It’s why we are here. We love our kids. I am so proud of all you [former Reading Recovery students] who stood up. You know who really deserves this award? Each one of you, who put in the time every day of the year.”