There’s a new lounge in town, and it’s especially created for kids and families.
Casey & Charlie’s Foundation for Dogs and Kids’ Lectura Lounge, located at 1960 Prospector Drive #106, is designed to be a community living room where students and their parents can drop into and learn a second language, said Maritza Roño Refuerzo, the foundation’s vice president and program director.
“We’re hoping to start with a program called Reading Buddies and then expand to language conversation,” she said.
Reading Buddies is based on a weekly bilingual literacy program in San Francisco, Roño Refuerzo said.
“Volunteers, mostly parents, would read in their dominant language to kids whose language was different from theirs,” she said. “So English speakers would read with English learners, and Spanish learners would read with Spanish speakers.”
While the Reading Buddies program at the Lectura Lounge is scheduled to start on Jan. 18, the public is invited to an open house from 1:30-5:30 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 12.
“People can come and check out what the lounge is like,” she said. “They can see our setup and enjoy some pizza and other goodies.”
Offering pizza at the open house also stems from the Reading Buddies program in San Francisco, Roño Refuerzo said.
“The incentive to get families involved with that program was pizza,” she said with a laugh. “There would be mingling for about a half an hour before each session in the teachers’ lounge, and that would draw a lot of people. And then we’d all go to the school’s library and separate into groups to read. Sometimes there would be up to 30 kids.”
Literacy, especially bilingual literacy, is an important part of Roño Refuerzo’s life.
She is the author of “Groovy Girl,” winner of the 2022 National Indie Excellence Award for Asian American Pacific Islander fiction, and its sequel, “Groovy Girl 2: Sabina Saved.”
“I always envisioned running this kind of program to promote learning a second language,” said Roño Refuerzo, who earned a master of fine arts in English and creative writing at Mills College. “We are also slowly building our collection of Spanish and English books, and we have created this type of living room space with couches, tables and chairs that is all colorful, comfortable and welcoming.”
The Lectura Lounge will complement the dual-immersion classes that are held at Park City School District schools, said Roño Refuerzo’s husband, Ray Refuerzo, president of Casey & Charlie’s Foundation for Dogs and Kids.
“Utah is very big on dual-language immersion, and there are a lot of studies that show those whose first language is either Spanish or French learn English faster, because they learn an easier language first,” said Refuerzo, who has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and a masters degree in industrial engineering and operations research. “Even though we’ll start with Spanish, we plan to start a French program in the future.”
Refuerzo and Roño Refuerzo established Casey & Charlie’s Foundation for Dogs and Kids as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit in 2015, shortly before moving to Park City four years ago.
“Our mission is to promote language and arts enrichment for kids,” Roño Refuerzo said. “The dogs part of the nonprofit is to promote the physical health and well-being of these animals.”
The couple have two children, Marco Casey and Emilio Charley, who are respective students at Treasure Mountain Junior High School and McPolin Elementary.
“While we lived in San Francisco, they participated in the Reading Buddies program at their school, and I always wanted to do something like that,” Roño Refuerzo said.
To help facilitate the Reading Buddies program, the Lectura Lounge seeks donations of books that are both in Spanish, English and French, Refuerzo said.
“We also have plans to show bilingual movies and provide bilingual board games,” he said.
Roño Refuerzo also hopes to give parents opportunities to get involved.
“Some parents of dual-immersion students don’t know the language their kids are learning,” she said. “So, while the kids learn things at school, they don’t have the opportunity to practice at home.”
Another program in development is a conversation program, Roño Refuerzo said.
“Similar to Reading Buddies, we’ll have volunteers who will speak in their dominant languages with kids who are learning the language,” she said
As of now, the Lectura Lounge is in need of Reading Buddies volunteers, Refurezo said.
“People can visit the Lectura Lounge link on our website and RSVP to sign up,” he said. “They will see a schedule, and select which shift they would like and tell us what their primary language is. We’ll then send them an email with slots, and they’ll get credits for volunteer hours.”