Cat In The Hat And All That

By STEVE LOPEZ

It may be enough for most small towns to have that big billboard at the edge of town, broadcasting their claim to fame.

TURF GRASS CAPITAL OF THE WORLD.

But in Tifton, Ga. (pop. 15,000), no one was turning cartwheels, flush with pride. Any day now, a new claim will go up, and when it does, the whole town will party.

The story begins in 1996, when Spencer Elementary School teacher-librarian Terri Nalls had a problem. Her students, 92% of them low income, couldn't read a stop sign let alone a book. She wondered if Mike Brumby, who ran the Tift County Foundation for Educational Excellence, could help her buy a reading program called Accelerated Reader.

Spencer had the lowest scores in town, so Brumby said yes. And by the end of that school year, townsfolk were slackjawed. The 400 Spencer students, many from homes in which neither parent could read, had devoured 25,000 books. And Brumby began thinking, WELCOME TO TIFTON, READING CAPITAL OF THE WORLD.

Had a nice ring to it, everyone agreed. But how long had he been in the sun? "It's rural Southern Georgia, and the illiteracy rate pushes 30% or 40%," admits Brumby. But if Spencer students had gone freakishly bookworm, why couldn't every child and adult in Tift County (pop. 35,000)? A big banner went up outside the town library, with weekly updates on the number of books read. The goal? One million. Everyone but the students thought Brumby was whacked.

If you're a parent, you can relate to the shock Tifton parents felt when, without threats, leg shackles, the smashing of TVs or the withholding of video-game privileges, their children began reading books before, during and after school. "It got to where you had to say, 'No more books,'" says Lenell Lindsey, a second-grade teacher at Lastinger Elementary. "You had to say, 'There's more to school than reading books all the time.'"

Part of the credit went to a new method of linking reading instruction with writing. But Accelerated Reader, by Renaissance Learning in Wisconsin Rapids, Wis., was a huge hit with kids. Used in 51,000 U.S. schools, it's essentially a software program. A student doesn't get credit for reading a book before passing a test of anywhere from five to 20 questions.

Dr. Seuss is worth 1/2 point, Tolstoy 130 points, and students can redeem points for everything from a pencil (10 points) to a trip to an Atlanta Braves game (150 points). And if you think the tests are giveaways, guess who flunked The Cat in the Hat test last week, flubbing 3 out of 5. Like you would have remembered if it was a A) windy, B) sunny, C) snowy or D) wet day?

Last year Tift schools shot up 14 points in statewide reading tests. At G.O. Bailey Elementary, Gladis Aguire, 8, went from not speaking a word of English and flunking first grade to being the top reader in her class a year later. Adults began wearing badges that say HEY, WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING? Tammie Smith, principal at Northside Elementary, has parents coming in an hour before the start of school, "taking tests right alongside their kids."

Last week, in a final push, the mayor dusted off Gone With the Wind, Lastinger second-grader Stephen Sumner ripped through Tom Sawyer and aced 19 out of 20 questions, and Rotarians challenged Kiwanians to a read-off. At Lastinger, Kaitlyn Pritchard, 7, nailed the test on a book called Arthur's Eyes. The 1/2 point gave her 20 for the year, and she couldn't wait to tell her parents. "I'm going to surprise them tonight," she said.

This week or next, a Tift County man, woman or child will close a book, pass a test and push the point total over a million. Because primary schoolers have read so many 1/2-point books, the points translate to roughly 1 million books.

Strike up the Tift County High marching band. On Nov. 15 the football stadium will be jammed for the celebration, and a new billboard will soon grace the highway, forever shadowing the sod industry. But how does Tifton know it has read more books per capita than any other town? "We don't," says Brumby. "But we welcome all challenges. The idea was to teach a love of books to children, and we've done that."

(E-mail your story ideas to Steve_Lopez@ timeinc.com