The Office of Instructional Practices and Evaluation at the South Carolina Department of Education presented the opportunity for selected elementary schools to implement the Summer Reading Project this summer based on research by Richard Allington.  His research indicated that students retain more reading skills when they select books to read during the summer.  South Elementary was fortunate to be chosen as one of the schools to participate.  South held its “free book fair” on June 3rd.  Students selected 8 books to read over the summer and help build up their home libraries.  Parents were sent a reading log to keep track of the number of minutes the students read each day.