University center makes book donation

Last Tuesday, 300 students at McCosh elementary school in Woodlawn went home with brand new books, which may have been the first they have ever owned, thanks to the University’s Center for School Improvement and its work with the Chicago First Book Local Advisory Board. The Center for School Improvement has been seeking new ways to help improve the quality of neighborhood schools in the area for more than a decade. Teaming up with First Book, a national not-for-profit organization dedicated to providing children from low-income families with the opportunity to read and own their first new books, is another step in that direction. In this photo, McCosh teacher Jennifer Manz-Jongsma reads from one of the donated books with second- and third-graders.