Literacy Now, a non-profit organization empowering children and families through literacy and life skills, will host its 10th Annual Literacy Now Guild Luncheon, Celebrate Reading! Fiesta, at the Junior League of Houston.

Luncheon Chairs Shelby Doehring and Dawn Zieren along with the Literacy Now Guild will join keynote speaker, Belinda Mays, award-winning author and speaker, for this incredible event benefiting the children and families that Literacy Now serves.

The mission of the Literacy Now Guild is to assist with program activities and events, help to raise program funds, and spread awareness of the organization. The organization’s main goal is to empower students to read on grade level by the end of third grade, thereby increasing the likelihood they will remain on track to graduate from high school and be ready to pursue their postsecondary goals.

Each year, 41 percent of young children in Houston are not ready for kindergarten lacking vital reading skills. For students already in Houston elementary schools, 73 percent of 3rd graders do not read at grade level. Literacy Now supports these children and their families in HISD and Aldine ISD and community sites throughout Houston.