General Electric Chairman Jeff Immelt Issues $250,000 Grant to Boost Literacy of Philadelphia's Children; GE expands 10-year alliance with Greater Philadelphia Cares.

PHILADELPHIA -- General Electric and Greater Philadelphia Cares today extended their 10-year relationship in a new effort to boost literacy among grade school-aged children in Philadelphia. GE has issued a $250,000 grant to fund the organization's Reading STARS program, a proven, volunteer-driven one-on-one tutoring program offered to boost the core classroom curriculum within the School District of Philadelphia.

"A lifetime of learning begins with strong reading skills," said GE CEO Jeff Immelt, who joined Greater Philadelphia Cares CEO Lissa Hilsee at Sheppard Elementary School to announce the grant. "As the city celebrates the birthday of Ben Franklin, who established the colonies' first circulation library, we're pleased to help the next generation of its citizens use their reading skills to discover the world of possibilities open to them."

Prior to announcing the grant, Immelt sat with Grade K-4 students in small groups and listened as they demonstrated their reading ability, using age-appropriate books GE donated about Ben Franklin. Through a workplace book drive, GE employees also donated nearly 1,600 books to the school. Sheppard Elementary is one of 11 Reading STARS participating sites, which include schools, community centers and corporate sites. At present there are 285 students participating in the program.

"Both GE and Greater Philadelphia Cares are committed to results in what we set out to do, making us perfect partners for this initiative," said Hilsee. "Reading STARS delivers real results based on actual before and after testing using the Dolch Word, Decoding, and WRAT Grade Score. Furthermore, teachers and parents see an immediate and lasting improvement in children who work with our volunteers in the program."

While the School District has experienced rising test scores over the past four years, and invested in core curriculum and instructional materials, according to the most recent PSSA test, 43.4% of Philadelphia students in the fifth grade are considered below "basic" in reading skill level.

Greater Philadelphia Cares launched Reading STARS in 2003 to mobilize thousands of volunteers to address the pressing need for high-quality, individualized supplemental reading instruction for beginning and remedial readers in the region. A volunteer-powered program, Reading STARS brings students who are learning to read up to grade level (based on the WRAT Grade Score) in an average of 20 hours for kindergartners and first-graders, and 40 hours for second- and third-graders.

Even more interesting is how the program can help the tutors, who in some cases are older students at the same school. For instance, at one site, sixth grade students who tutored first grade students experienced an increase of two or more grade levels in their own reading skills over the course of the program, and three of these sixth grade tutors finished the program reading beyond a high school level.

"We welcome the additional support that the hundreds of volunteers are able to offer, via one-on-one tutoring," said Philadelphia School District CEO Paul Vallas. "Reading STARS underscores the importance of bringing all sectors of the community - volunteers, corporations, schools - together to address the needs of Philadelphia's children."

Sheppard Elementary was selected to announce the GE grant because it has embraced the Reading STARS program. Volunteers worked individually with 46 of the school's students, using the Reading STARS program, adding a boost to the School District's new core curriculum and investment in professional development. As with other Reading STARS sites, tutors at the school come from a number of sources, including residents, city-based corporate sponsors, college students, and volunteer organizations such as Experience Corps. The success of this individualized coaching program has also fueled a growing demand from the community. Interested volunteers are urged to contact the offices of Greater Philadelphia Cares for more information, or visit their website at www.gpcares.com.

"This support from General Electric demonstrates their commitment to doing something tangible about the problem," said Hilsee, "thanks to their generosity, more students will soon be able to enjoy the success that the students of Sheppard Elementary have accomplished," said Hilsee.

About Greater Philadelphia Cares:

Recently named Non-Profit of the Year by the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, and celebrating over 10 years of service to the community, Greater Philadelphia Cares supports the creation of vibrant communities by motivating people to volunteer their time, talents, and resources by inspiring leadership and through the design of innovative programs. The organization provides a clear path to service for all, enhancing the impact of non-profit agencies throughout the Greater Philadelphia region. To learn more, log on to www.gpcares.com or call 215-564-4544.

About General Electric

GE (NYSE:GE) is Imagination at Work -- a diversified technology, media and financial services company dedicated to creating products that make life better. From aircraft engines and power generation to financial services, medical imaging, television programming, and plastics, GE operates in more than 100 countries and employs more than 300,000 people worldwide. In the Delaware Valley, GE has 3,600 employees with a payroll of $268 million, along with 7,000 pensioners and 28,000 individual shareholders. For more information, visit the company's Web site at www.ge.com.

The Reading STARS grant by GE is part of a four-part approach the company has been taking locally over the past several years to address both education and social needs in the region. The GE businesses in the region have raised nearly more than a million dollars for United Way the past two years, annually sponsor and supply a 500-person GE painting team at the annual Philadelphia Cares Day school fix-up day each Fall, host technology and mentoring programs for high school students, and support housing refurbishment in the region through their GE Builds Hope programs. All efforts are ongoing, and in some cases, as in Philadelphia Cares Day, have been in place for 10 years.

The Fairfield-Conn.-based GE Foundation funds locally the Algebra Pipeline to Engineering Careers program at the University of Pennsylvania, which encourages sixth and seventh grade students to pursue mathematics, and has also provided a $250,000 grant to the National Constitution Center, to fund field trips there over a five year period for more than 2,000 Philadelphia city school district students. The GE Foundation annually makes grants to several Philadelphia area colleges totaling an average of $400,000 as part of its Higher Education Matching Grants program with GE employees and retirees.

About Sheppard Elementary:

The Issac Sheppard Elementary School, located at 120 W. Cambria Street in Philadelphia, serves 360 children from Kindergarten to fourth grades. James Otto is the Principal.

About Reading STARS

Reading STARS stands out among literacy programs in two important ways: First, it is scripted, enabling anyone with a 5th grade reading level to coach a student through to full literacy; Second, its step-by-step approach provides all students with the basics - the tools essential to achieving a 100% success rate.

The only requirement for volunteers to teach the Reading STARS program is that they themselves can read at or above a fifth-grade level. Tutors sit opposite students with a tented book between them. On the instructor's side are scripted prompts, and on the student's are lessons. Through this process, the student uncovers the information that they missed along the way that kept them from moving forward.

Before beginning Reading STARS, students complete several assessments of their oral reading, reading comprehension, and spelling skills. These same assessments are used again at the completion of Reading STARS to measure the success of the program. Test scores from past project sites show a dramatic rise in students' reading skills and school officials report greatly improved reading comprehension scores among the students. The program supplements the School District's curriculum and instructional reforms which have raised reading and language arts skills in students across the District for four consecutive years.