“It’s a good goal to get kids reading. But, how transformative and sustainable would it be to get kids to WANT to read?”
– Kwame Alexander, Founder, One Word at a Time
We want to bring Author Study into 1,000 schools this year!
Kwame Alexander founded One Word at a Time to spark middle-grade students’ motivation to read and write. He's seen time and again, in thousands of school visits around the world, the transformative power of children meeting favorite authors.
Today, fewer than 1 in 5 U.S. 13-year-olds reads for pleasure on a daily basis, down from more than 1 in 3 in 1984. And the consequences reach far beyond reading test scores: research shows that reading for pleasure leads to increased academic achievement, sharper critical thinking skills, deeper empathy, and stronger mental health. Kids who don’t read for fun miss out on developing one of the best tools available for lifelong learning and active citizenship.
Although there are many causes for the decline in pleasure reading, our flagship program, Author Study, can be a solution. By connecting students across the country with published authors through live, interactive virtual sessions, Author Study gives middle-grade students — kids ages 9-13, the age group most likely to be losing their relationship with reading — a spark that increases their enthusiasm for reading outside of school. Author Study is not a curriculum. It is not an intervention strategy. It is not a test-prep tool. Author Study is an experience designed to do what decades of research suggests is the missing ingredient: make reading feel personal, exciting, and worth choosing.
In short, we’re making reading cool and fun again! Because of Author Study, kids WANT to read on their own. And in our inaugural year, we’ve seen great results – evidence that Author Study works and can be scaled up.
Author Study 2025-26 reached over 55,000 students in nearly 400 schools. Our September 2025 Literacy Pep Rally reached almost 80,000 students! Participating educators reported a 42% increase in reading motivation across the year. That's HUGE!
Educators saw more library loans, requests for books in new genres, conversations about books in the hallways, and our favorite -- kids writing poetry on their own. 95% of participating educators surveyed said they'd recommend Author Study to a colleague.
This year -- we're aiming higher! We want to bring Author Study to 1,000 schools in 2026-27. That's as many as 100,000 students who can be part of this joyful reading community. And you can be part of this movement.
Will you help us get kids excited about reading? By becoming a donor, you’re helping us build on our first year's momentum, nurture this joyful community, and create powerful programming that sparks deep, lifelong reading engagement.
Whether you can give $25 or $2,500, every gift makes a difference. Plus, a donation of $100 or more allows you to nominate a classroom or library to receive a FREE Author Study subscription. Donations of $1,000 or more can nominate an entire school!
Explore the full donation levels HERE and join us on our mission to change the world one school at a time, one classroom at a time, one student at a time - One Word at a Time!
See this year's Author Study schedule, sign up for our free Literacy Pep Rally, and learn more about One Word at a Time's efforts to engage students in the joys of reading: