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Prime Time Coming to Nearly 40 Sites This Spring

What time is it? Spring! Spring Prime Time, that is.

This spring, Prime Time welcomes programs at nearly 40 sites in 20 parishes around Louisiana. Schools, libraries, and other community-oriented organizations will host Prime Time programs between February and May. They’ll be inviting hundreds of families to dine, read, and converse (featuring open-ended questions) with our well-trained teams of scholars, storytellers, and facilitators.

You can view a map of Louisiana programs to see if there’s one taking place near you. For sites outside of Louisiana, refer to your state council for information about Prime TIme.

If you are in a state that doesn’t yet have Prime Time, contact us at [email protected] about how to start that conversation with your state’s humanities council or library system.

Prime Time Head Start Joins Revitalization of Historic Campus

Prime Time Head Start and Early Head Start will add four classrooms at Holy Rosary Institute, expanding its classroom capacity to serve more students while also helping to bring life back to the historic campus.

The added classrooms will allow Prime Time to accept 60 additional Head Start students in a renovated space that was formerly a cafeteria at the site. Located less than a mile from Prime Time’s Lafayette campus at Immaculate Heart of Mary, the location will allow Prime Time to leverage the family services and other resources on the IHM campus at the Holy Rosary site as well.

“Much like our center at IHM, this is a unique opportunity for Prime Time to be part of the revitalization of an important educational institution in Lafayette and is in keeping with the mission of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities to preserve Louisiana’s important historical and cultural past while planning for a brighter future,” said Miranda Restovic, president and executive director of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities.

Founded in 1913, Holy Rosary Institute, located at 421 Carmel Street in Lafayette, began as an early vocational and technical school for African American females. In 1947, it began admitting males and provided an education to the Black community which would not otherwise have been available during that time. The main school closed in 1993 and efforts soon began to revitalize the campus. The Holy Rosary Redevelopment Corporation was created in 2010 with the goal of restoring the 40-acre site and returning it to a place of prominence in the community as a center for educational, economic, social, cultural and spiritual development.

“We are excited to add our partnership with Prime Time Head Start to the many positive developments happening at Holy Rosary,” said Dustin Cravins, Holy Rosary Redevelopment president. “This investment strengthens our commitment to creating a brighter future for the community and ensuring Holy Rosary continues to be a place of growth and opportunity.”

The project marks the second time Prime Time has been part of bringing back a historic campus in Lafayette. Opened in 1934, Immaculate Heart of Mary church and school, at 812 12th St. in Lafayette, were created to be the home for the first four Black priests to be trained and ordained in the United States. The school educated generations of Lafayette residents before closing ahead of the 2016-17 school year. The Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities opened Prime Time Head Start and Early Head Start in the school in 2022 and recently constructed an additional wing to expand its services to nearly 300 children between the ages of six weeks and five years old at the site.

Prime Time Head Start Expands Lafayette Campus

Prime Time Head Start and Early Head Start at Immaculate Heart of Mary in Lafayette recently celebrated the expansion of its campus. The celebration marked the opening of a new wing that, in addition to other renovations, is allowing Prime Time to serve nearly 200 more children between the ages of 6 weeks and 5 years old on the campus this school year.

The new wing includes five new classrooms. Other improvements on the Lafayette campus include a new playground and renovation of part of the gymnasium into another five classrooms, renovations to its restrooms, repairs to the structure’s roof, and other general maintenance. In total, the work represents a $1.5 million investment in early childhood education in Lafayette Parish and brings the total number of children served at the school to nearly 300.

Prime Time was honored to have more than 50 local government officials, community partners, families, and staff on hand to help officially open the new wing. The celebration also featured a performance by students and helped to kick off October as Head Start Awareness Month.

You can view more photos from the event on our Facebook page.

It’s Time to Apply for Prime Time

Community groups are invited to bring families together around reading by hosting a free Prime Time family engagement and literacy program in the spring.

Applications will be accepted until Oct. 15 frome organizations that would like to host either Prime Time Family Reading, for ages 6-10, or Prime Time Preschool Reading, for ages 3-5.

Eligible organizations include schools, libraries, museums, churches and other community-based agencies that possess a valid EIN#. Prime Time, a program of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, offers families a chance to come together to share a meal, read, and discuss the important themes often found in children’s books.

“The magic of a Prime Time program happens after the book,” said Miranda Restovic, president and executive director of the LEH and Prime Time, Inc. “We dive deep into discussions about topics such as bravery, community, and resilience that help open up lines of communication between family members, bring to light experiences that may never have been shared otherwise, and show that it’s OK to have different views.”

Prime Time’s 90-minute sessions take place once a week for six weeks. Prime Time is free for families and the organizations that host the program. Each partner site also receives a $1,000 site support stipend and a set of the children’s books used during the program, and participating families keep all the books for their personal home libraries as well.

“Prime Time is like no other program I have participated in,” said Deborah Alexander, principal of Eighty-First Street ECE. “We are able to add new energy to family reading nights. The high-quality materials and supplies that are provided and allowed through stipends give us the ability to offer something different to our families and community.”

Parents learn Prime Time Techniques at Workshop

Parents and caregivers learned skills to help them implement Prime Time techniques at home with their children during Prime Time’s recent HomeRoom@Home workshop.

HomeRoom@Home seeks to build confidence in parents and caregivers as their child’s first and most important educator. Parents and children did activities together, and then seperately so that parents and caregivers could do a deep dive into topics such as using open-ended questions to spark deep discussions, vocabulary and language skills, and bonding and social development – all from reading children’s books together.

HomeRoom@Home grew out of Prime Time’s workshop for educators, HomeRoom, to support parents and caregivers during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is the first time is was held in person. The program involves both children and their grown-ups in the exchange of ideas to help build early critical-thinking skills, literacy and the foundation for a love of learning.

Each family also went home with a Prime Time Box containing a set of Prime Time-approved children’s books, activity supplies, and a Grown-up Guide, which guides adults through discussion of each of the books with their child.

HomeRoom@Home was brought to New Orleans area families through the support of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

Storyteller Spotlight: Melissa Gemeinhardt

Melissa Gemeinhardt has been involved with Prime Time for more than 10 years. She has served as a Prime Time preschool facilitator, scholar, storyteller, preschool assistant, and trainer. Additionally, she supported Prime Time in the development of the Prime Time Preschool Reading program.

LEH Announces Light Up for Literacy and Other Humanities Awards Winners

Each year, the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities – Prime Time’s parent organization – celebrates all the humanities have to offer and honor those who have made significant contributions to the understanding of Louisiana’s history and culture through the Humanities Awards. 

Presented in partnership with the State Library of Louisiana’s Center for the Book, the Light Up for Literacy award recognizes those who have made significant and lasting contributions to literacy efforts in the state. This year’s Light Up for Literacy honoree is Jane Wolfe, the founder of Eat and Read at Melba’s, one of New Orleans’s most notable nonprofit literacy programs. Through Eat and Read at Melba’s, Jane has encouraged a love of reading by distributing more than 20,000 free books to her customers and hosting readings, discussions, and book‐signings that connect New Orleanians with world‐renowned authors and educators. 

Wolfe, and the rest of this year’s Humanities Awards winners including Humanist of the Year Richard “Dickie” Landry, will be honored at the Bright Lights awards dinner on April 23. 

View a full list of award winners 

Applications Open to Host Prime Time Reading Program

Can generosity ever be a bad thing? What makes a place home? What should you do if you think a law is unfair? Is it all right to deceive someone when you think doing so may benefit them?

These are just a few of the questions children and their families will seek to answer this fall during free Prime Time family engagement and reading programs hosted across Louisiana by local community groups.

Organizations interested in hosting these programs can apply from March 15 through April 15. Eligible organizations include schools, libraries, museums, churches, government entities, and other community-based agencies located anywhere in Louisiana that possess a valid EIN#.

An initiative of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH), Prime Time programs start with a shared meal, and then a storyteller reads families an award-winning children’s book. Following the reading, families are engaged in discussion around the themes found in the book using open-ended questions.

“Organizations get to choose the book series that is relevant to their communities,” said Miranda Restovic, president and executive director of the LEH and Prime Time, Inc. “These may include sustainability, inquiry, caring, democracy, or food. Each of these series contains children’s books deliberately chosen to stimulate discussion around the theme.”

Prime Time programs are free for the organizations that host them and for the families who attend. They can choose to host either Prime Time Family Reading, for ages 6-10, or Prime Time Preschool Reading, for ages 3-5. Organizations whose applications are approved will host the 90-minute sessions once a week for six weeks. Each partner site will receive a $1,000 site support stipend, stipends for team members, and a set of the children’s books used during the program. Participating families also keep all books for their personal home libraries.

More than 60 Prime Time family engagement and reading programs are currently taking place across Louisiana.

“The partner organizations across the state that host our family engagement and reading programs are really our boots on the ground, encouraging literacy, promoting family bonding, and nurturing a love of books and learning in their own communities,” said Sarah Withers, LEH vice president of education programs. “We couldn’t bring Prime Time to so many families without them.”

For more information about Prime Time reading programs, email [email protected].

Spring 2024 Program Sites Announced

Families in more than 60 communities across Louisiana will gather to share a meal, read a book, and engage in thought-provoking discussion at a Prime Time program this spring.

Prime Time, an initiative of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, brings families together twice a year at schools, libraries and other community-gathering places for its award-winning reading programs. Beginning in February, Prime Time family engagement and reading programs will take place in 25 parishes across Louisiana and represents one of the largest program cycles to date.

Prime Time Family Reading, for ages 6-10, and Prime Time Preschool Reading, for ages 3-5, bring families together one night a week for six weeks for reading and discussion. A storyteller reads an award-winning children’s book and families are then guided through discussion of the themes found in the book. The discussion encourages families to personally connect with literature and each other and think beyond shallow considerations of who, what, when, and where by using open-ended questioning to spur discussion. For Preschool Reading, hands-on activities are incorporated to keep younger children engaged.

Prime Time programs are free for families and the partner organizations throughout the state that host them. Families also get to keep the books from the sessions to help build their home libraries. Families can find a Prime Time reading program in their community on our program map.

Prime Time will also be expanding a writing component piloted last year in New Orleans to Northwest Louisiana. All About Me encourages children ages 3 to 5 to write and share about themselves — their names, likes, families, routines, and the things that make them happy. Participating families create their own books, furthering the Prime Time mission by creating a strong foundation not only for young readers but for young writers as well.

Prime Time’s spring reading programs are sponsored by Entergy, the Charles Lamar Family Foundation, the Charles T. Beaird Foundation, the Community Foundation of North Louisiana, the Shell Foundation, Baptist Community Ministries, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Citgo, the Zemurray Foundation and the State of Louisiana.

Prime Time’s Podcast Airing Now

The second season of Prime Time’s “Little Voices, Big Ideas” podcast is now live, with vignettes of each episode featured weekly on Red River Radio in Shreveport and WWNO in New Orleans and WRKF in Baton Rouge. Produced by Prime Time, a subsidiary of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH), in partnership with WWNO/New Orleans Public Radio, “Little Voices, Big Ideas” explores the rich and often surprising content of children’s books and provides caregivers with ways to have meaningful conversations with children.

Originally developed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the podcast has allowed the LEH and Prime Time to expand its award-winning literacy program to the airwaves and the internet. The second season of the podcast, which will be available to download free on all podcast streaming services and at wwno.org, is based on the Prime Time book series “Of, By, and For the People” and examines themes of American democracy and civic participation.

Each of the six episodes is hosted by mother of two and LEH Director of Curriculum and National Partners Sarah DeBacher, with contributions from humanities scholar Dr. Thomas Wartenberg, historian and children’s book author Freddi Evans, The Reading Life host Susan Larson, and early childhood literacy scholar Kyley Pulphus.

“Each episode offers historical, philosophical and cultural connections, as well as practical advice that help listeners go beyond the bedtime story,” said DeBacher. “We also include recorded conversations between children and caregivers that illustrate how the books can turn families into philosophers who engage with concepts and ideas relevant to the business of being human.”

Together, the group breaks down the structures behind the stories and interrogates the messages the stories seem to send, asking questions of one another and the story. This humanities-centered approach is proven to help children develop critical-thinking skills and the foundational skills necessary for a lifelong love of learning.

Prime Time has provided award-winning, humanities-based programming to more than 53,000 families in Louisiana since its creation 30 years ago. Each episode of “Little Voices, Big Ideas” follows the structure of the discussion portion of a traditional Prime Time Family Reading program, where participants are asked questions about the book and engage in dialogue about its major themes. The books included this season are “The Big Orange Splot” by Daniel Pinkwater, “Sophia Valdez, Future Prez” by Andrea Beaty, “We Are Water Protectors” by Carole Lindstrom, “Granddaddy’s Turn: A Journey to the Ballot Box” by Michael S. Bandy and Eric Stein, “Click, Clack, Moo: Cows that Type” by Doreen Cronin, and “The Day You Begin” by Jacqueline Woodson.

Episodes, which run between 20 and 30 minutes, will be released weekly for the next six weeks after the four-minute vignettes have aired. Listeners in Southeast Louisiana can hear vignettes on Thursdays in the afternoon during All Things Considered on WWNO 89.9 FM in New Orleans and WRKF 89.3 FM in Baton Rouge Dec. 21 through Jan. 25. In Central and Northwest Louisiana, the vignettes will be airing on Red River Radio on Wednesdays Dec. 20 through Jan. 24. Full episodes will be available wherever listeners find their podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and more and also online at wwno.org.

The podcast is made possible by funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Community Foundation of Northwest Louisiana and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in partnership with WWNO New Orleans and Red River Radio.

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