For 25 years, Jim Charanis has taken time out of his workweek to drive to an elementary school, sit with a young student and read a book out loud. Sometimes it was 30 minutes over lunch table; other times it was an hour in a corner of the library. In every instance, the connection was the same.
“Kids gain a love of reading and learn by hearing people read,” said the Sandy Springs resident. “They also build vocabulary through that process.
Charanis, a senior sales exec at NCR, became a reader through the Power Lunch program created by Everybody Wins, a nonprofit founded in 1997 to support students who were reading below grade level at Hope-Hill Elementary near downtown Atlanta. The program has evolved over the years and expanded beyond downtown.
When it started, Charanis’ job was part of a Georgia Tech start-up that also emphasized giving back to the community. That inspiration has led him to work with students at Dresden Elementary in Chamblee and now youngsters at Stripling Elementary in Norcross.
For the last several months, Charanis has worked with the same student. As he gets to know his partners, he often selects books they might like. Otherwise, teachers who have identified students in need of additional support usually pick grade-level books for the adult readers to share.
“I’ve had a lot of students from all over the reading spectrum,” he said. “If I’m lucky, I get to keep that child through elementary school, but a lot of kids move between schools or out of the area.”
Charanis worked with his current student partner last year when the boy was in third grade.
“But the young man is incredibly shy; I really have to draw him out,” he said. “I try to engage him to read, too, and sound out words, but that’s not the goal: The goal is for him to hear me read.”
Charanis has stuck with the regular gig because of the positive ways the students respond to having an adult read to them. And reading, he said, is one of his passions.
“I’m a software guy by trade, but literacy has always been interesting to me,” he said. “I know some people read to their kids, and others don’t. Even though I travel a lot, I just won’t let this go.”
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