Students earn $500 gift cards after completing reading challenge

JACKSON, Tenn. — A local school superintendent rewards students for their efforts.

Jackson-Madison County School System Superintendent, Dr. Marlon King, joined the ‘Leap Up for Literacy’ winners and their parents for a shopping spree this afternoon.

Each student was given a $500 dollar gift card to spend at Walmart.

The shopping spree honors the students’ diligence in completing the superintendent’s ‘Super Reader Challenge.’

The challenge encouraged students to read 20 minutes a day for 40 days.

South Side High School graduate, Elizabeth Alexander, is the high school district winner.

She shares advice for future reading challenge participants.

“A lot of different genres, you don’t need to get into one specific thing. If you don’t like non-fiction, there’s fiction out there. If you don’t like a specific genre of fiction, there are different genres out there and there’s always a community of people who always like the same things that you do so you can always find people who will enjoy the same stuff you do no matter how small it may seem,” said Alexander.

Alexander clocked in over 7,000 minutes of reading. That’s over 100 hours.

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