We asked each of our five founding partners to write a guest post describing how they support our goal of improving third grade reading rates. Gloria Rubio-Cortes, president of the National Civic League, describes how the All-America City Awards brought together communities dedicated to this critical milestone.

The All-America City Awards (AAC) is the flagship program of the National Civic League, and every year it recognizes communities for outstanding civic achievement. In 2012, AAC was part of an unprecedented mobilization effort to engage communities of all shapes and sizes to develop concrete, realistic ten-year action plans to significantly increase the number of at-risk students reading at grade level.

The award program became an important catalyst and recruitment platform for the emerging Grade-Level Reading Communities Network.   More than 120 cities, counties, regions (and one state) took up the challenge in 2012. Others have joined them since then, bringing the number to 142.

AAC and GLR have given hundreds of people a unique opportunity to come forward and play meaningful roles in ensuring that more children are ready for school success. These community leaders recognized that education is not the responsibility of any one institution. It is a community-wide duty.

We are delighted that the leadership has come from such a broad cross section of these communities—libraries, the local United Way, community foundations, schools, volunteer associations, mayors, parents and residents.

In one community, a business collaborative took the leading in going before the state legislature to advocate for early childhood learning. In other communities, voluntary associations are important actors within the GLR Network. We learned when young folks have a voice and a role in the planning and implementation they are more likely to engage in community efforts.

Given this opportunity to dream, plan and act with others, people really stepped to the plate. This willingness to take action on challenging issues is something we’ve seen again and again in communities across the country. With the GLR Network, people are expanding their roles and connecting schools and communities more effectively.