Maraist Family Foundation Supports Head Start
Family engagement at Prime Time Head Start and Early Head Start at Immaculate Heart of Mary in Lafayette, Louisiana, recently got a boost thanks to a $25,000 donation from the Maraist Family Foundation.
Like all things Prime Time, our Head Start and Early Head Start centers are family-focused, with programs designed to engage parents and guardians as partners to ensure that students build basic skills, develop a love of literacy, and hone critical-thinking abilities that will set the foundation for kindergarten readiness and lifelong learning. This generous donation will support three Prime Time Preschool Reading family literacy programs and monthly Family Engagement Network Meetings during the 2025-26 school year.
The Maraist Family Foundation supports organizations in coastal Louisiana that boost economic mobility, foster educational opportunity, and ensure that South Louisiana remains one of the most culturally-rich places on Earth.
New Jersey Joins Affiliate Network
Prime Time is thrilled to welcome a new affiliate partner to the national Prime Time family. The New Jersey Council for the Humanities (NJCH) will launch Prime Time Family Reading programs at two regional libraries. The North Bergen Free Public Library, located in a densely populated suburb of New York City, sits more than 100 miles from the Greenwich Branch of the Gloucester County Library, a suburb of Philadelphia. The libraries selected to host New Jersey’s first Prime Time programs signal the New Jersey council’s commitment to serving geographically diverse regions of the state. They also stand as a testimony to the natural partnerships between humanities councils and regional libraries made possible through Prime Time’s turnkey program model.
“We are so excited to join the national affiliate network for Prime Time Family Reading, allowing families here in the Garden State to explore the variety of cultural backgrounds that shape our NJ communities through reading together,” said NJCH Executive Director Carin Berkowitz. “We think that our diversity is our greatest strength, and we look forward to celebrating that through our participation in Prime Time!”
Gigi Naglak, NJCH’s director of programs, will serve as the state’s Prime Time affiliate project director. With more than a decade of experience in supporting statewide humanities programming through the NJCH, Gigi has already worked to thoughtfully launch a regionally diverse pilot cohort, and, in collaboration with Berkowitz, has plans to expand their statewide reach through Prime Time.
If you are interested in learning more about the Prime Time national affiliate network and how you can bring Prime Time to your state, contact Sarah DeBacher at [email protected].
Brooks Receives Light Up for Literacy Award
Congratulations to the recipient of the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities’ 2025 Light Up for Literacy Award: Prime Time’s own Lt. Michael Brooks.
Brooks’ Prime Time story began in 2017, when he had the big idea of creating a community center that would provide a safe haven for children and their families living in a high-crime area in Ascension Parish. Two years later, Brooks brought Prime Time to the Hickley M. Waguespack Center and Study Commons (or “The Wag Center,” as it’s lovingly called), where he has consistently implemented some of Prime Time’s most successful and robustly attended programs in the state. He has also transformed the community. His relentless focus on education, community engagement, and relationship building has resulted not just in wildly popular Prime Time programs but in the integration of a study commons, a Little Free Library, and other literacy and learning supports that have had a tangible impact on the region. Crime has dropped since the Wag Center took root, and another center built on its success is in the works in neighboring Iberville Parish.
Brooks received the award at the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities’ Bright Lights Awards Dinner on April 23 in Baton Rouge, where he also closed out the night in enthusiastic Prime Time fashion with his reading of Abiyoyo.
Celebrating its 40th anniversary, the Bright Lights Awards—formerly called the Humanities Awards and given by the LEH, Prime Time’s parent organization—offer a collective opportunity to celebrate all the humanities have to offer and honor documentary filmmakers and photographers, literacy and language advocates, historians and authors, culture advocates, and more.
Apply Now for Fall Prime Time
The Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities is seeking organizations that want to strengthen family bonds while promoting early literacy skills to host a Prime Time family engagement and reading program in the fall.
Organizations interested in hosting these programs can apply 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#.
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.
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 30 Prime Time family engagement and reading programs are currently taking place in 20 parishes across Louisiana. You can find a program near you on our program map.
For questions or help with your application, email [email protected].
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.
