Some Richmond High School students may not like the Sustained Silent Reading program, but it appears to be helping improve exit exam scores.

Students take this class every day of the school week for 30 minutes. The books are provided by the school, but students are also welcome to bring books of their own choice.

When asked, two out of the three students interviewed said they did not like the program.

“It’s boring,” said Estefania Terrez, an 11^th-grader. “Basically the kids don’t do anything. I don’t even know why we even have the class.  The majority of the kids don’t read. It’s like a free time to me. Overall I really wish that instead I had an extra class because I hate SSR.”

But Stacey Saechao disagreed, and would recommend Sustained Silent Reading to other schools.

It “helps your reading and writing skills improve and expands your vocabulary,” said Saechao, also an 11^th-grade student.

Vice Principal Nancy Ivey said that SSR “dramatically increased our CAHSEE scores … There was a big jump. We beat De Anza, and Kennedy.”

Ivey said Richmond High improved at every grade level.

“We are number four in the school district; we jumped up exactly 60 points,” she said.

According to the web site teachersnetwork.org, “for young people to succeed in school and beyond, it is imperative that they are literate. For the majority of students literacy poses no great problem. Reading happens.”

But for some, reading at school is imperative, according to the research conducted at the Los Angeles Public Library, illiteracy costs more than $225 billion a year in lost productivity and “is tied to unemployment, crime, poverty, and family problems.”

“For example,” the library said, “75 percent of unemployed adults have writing and/or reading difficulties. Sixty percent of all juvenile offenders have problems reading, while $5 billion is spent each year on welfare and unemployment compensation due to illiteracy.”