SMART Stories

SMART Reading’s Executive Director Jessica Bowersox reflects on her experience reading with Carley, a second-grader in the Portland area. 

  I grew up here in Portland, and I got to spend time with a one-on-one SMART volunteer when I was in elementary school. It was a very… Read More ›

Meet Innovative Services NW, one of the Children’s Book Bank’s community partners! Innovative Services NW’s early learning and childcare program serves children ages 1 – 5 years, many… Read More ›

Four new Little Free Libraries opened near Robert Gray Middle School and Bridlemile Elementary School in 2022! The Children’s Book Bank partnered with Positive Charge! PDX, the Timbers,… Read More ›

SMART Volunteer Sue has been reading with kids for over a decade! Here’s what she has to say about her experience, including going remote in 2020 and getting… Read More ›

To read the the first installment of Randall’s story, click here. For the second installment, click here.  Today, reflecting on his experience in SMART Reading, Randall credits the… Read More ›

To read the first installment in Randall’s story, click here.  After his volunteer would retrieve Randall from class, they’d walk together down the long hallway to the SMART… Read More ›

For Springfield second-grader, Randall, the classroom wasn’t a friendly place to be. His classmates teased and bullied him for being gay, and he looked for any opportunity to… Read More ›

“I own this,” Annie Teav remembers thinking the first time she got to choose a book to keep from SMART Reading. It was one of the first books… Read More ›