As part of its Ready To Learn (RTL) initiative, PBS SoCaL celebrated National Summer Learning Day on June 20, 2015. The goal of the event was to build awareness about the need for high-quality resources to reduce the summer learning slide in low-income communities. The station partnered with LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes -- a Mexican-American museum and cultural center in Los Angeles -- and 13 RTL partners to provide access to quality hands-on literacy and STEM learning experiences. RTL partners included the Children's Institute, Project Access, The Los Angeles Public Libraries,  Families in Schools,  PBS VIP Mommy Blogger la jaja kids, and local sponsors like the Children’s Hospital, the Zoo, Discovery Cube LA OC and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles.

Each RTL partner took the pledge to keep kids learning this summer and provided an interactive hands-on activity for families and children. Families also had the opportunity to explore LA Plaza’s edible teaching garden and learned about how to compost and harvest their own vegetables and fruits.

The event also included children’s authors, meet and greets with Curious George and Buddy from DINOSAUR TRAIN and the PBS SoCaL Mobile Lab. PBS SoCaL shared resources from PBS KIDS and the National Summer Learning Association website, and encouraged families to think about learning opportunities while school was not in session. The event was an all-encompassing learning experience for the approximately 1,500 people present and succeeded in engaging a targeted group of low-income families. This was helped in part by a coordinated promotion effort between the community partners, which included email, e-newsletters, social media and bilingual flyers, as well as on-air promotion by PBS SoCaL in conjunction with special PBS KIDS Summer Safari programming.  

Enjoy a slide show of pictures from the event: https://www.flickr.com//photos/pbssocal/sets/72157654936023805/show/

Read more about other PBS SoCaL Ready To Learn events and outreach.