Supports a school-site literacy coordinator — the on-the-ground person who makes the program work for every child at a site.

Supports a teacher training cohort — equipping the educators who touch every child in those critical K-3 years.

Helps fund  weekly reading intervention — from the first day of school to the last. 

Funds a classroom literacy kit and a semester of targeted reading support for one class.

Fundraisers

Reaching this goal will  support 12 schools this year, ensuring 2,000+ students reach reading proficiency by third grade.

K3 Innovation

Every child reading by the end of third grade.

According to the CA State Assessment, only 

41% of 3rd grade students meet state reading

Because fourth grade is the pivot point when children shift from learning to read to reading to learn. A child who isn't reading proficiently by then is far more likely to struggle in school and less likely to graduate. 

Reading is the foundation everything else is built on.

"Literacy is everything. If you show me a third grader who is literate and proficient, you have shown me a future high school graduate." 


, Sonoma County Superintendent of Schools

A local literacy program backed by K-3 Innovation, places literacy coaches and trained instructional aides directly in classrooms, delivers structured small-group instruction, and puts real-time data (STAR assessments and the Lexia reading platform) in teachers' hands so they can meet each child exactly where they are. 

Our single, urgent mission:

 partner with local schools so that every child reads proficiently by the end of third grade. 

“I had a student reading 3 words per minute with grade-level materials. He gained over 600 Lexia units during the school year and ended the year reading almost 60 words per minute.”


, first-year implementation school, teacher survey, May 2026

K-3 Innovation founders, Marcia and Gary Nelson will match every gift dollar for dollar up to $250,000 from today through December 31st. Each gift brings us closer to our $1 million goal to put a proven reading program within reach for 2,000+ students across twelve schools.


"No nonprofit investment offers a greater return to our community than helping a child learn to read."

, Founder & Board President, K-3 innovation

The investment of helping a child learn to read is modest. The cost of inaction is enormous.