Episode 79 - Denise Corbo: Never Stop Learning

This week, Samantha talks with the President and Founder of Storybook Treasures, Denise Corbo. Storybook Treasures is a nonprofit with the mission of “putting books into the hearts, hands, and homes of children in need.” Denise was an educator for over 30 years, but she says that teaching found her. She doesn’t describe herself as being a good student growing up, and school was hard for her.

She took cosmetology (vocation education) in HS, but her teacher told her that she needed to go to college instead of learn cosmetology. So, she eventually had to make a shift in high school to take extra classes and summer school to prepare for admission to college. Then, once in college, she graduated in just 2.5 years.

Denise says, “I have a plan, but God always seems to have a bigger plan.” Doors close, so she then has to ask herself what to do next and make the pivot to figure out how to get it done. She negotiated with her mom to get into a private school, graduated in 2.5 years, and out of school she became a cosmetology teacher.

It is her journey that has enabled her to be a better teacher to her students.

How does she keep pushing through to doing big things? She is a perfectionist, but she has learned to forgive herself. There’s a growth mindset associated with how she reacts to situations. Her journey has included teaching cosmetology for 5 years, then getting her masters degree in K-8 education. She was then required to do student-teaching. After her student-teaching the principal offered her a job as a first grade teacher. It wasn’t her ideal spot, but she decided to go for it.

Storybook Treasures started in her kindergarten classroom. When you teach, you have to meet the challenge of getting all of the kids where they need to be in order to meet a criteria set for all students. Children all grow differently and they all develop at different rates, and she didn’t feel good about telling the parents of some of the kids that they weren’t up to “standards.”

When you read a book to a child in the classroom, that book immediately becomes a hot commodity for the children and make a connection to it. She found that when she had multiple copies of her favorites in her classroom, the children were able to make connections to the book; connections that just can't be taught. So, Denise decided to create treasures to go along with the books that gave the kids another connection to the book. All of these connections helped the kids with retelling and literacy on a level that she had never seen before.

Of course, there were challenges as Storybook Treasures started to materialize. There were issues with childrens' attention during class, so she shifted again to get the “treasures” to be something done at home. Then, she found that the parents were reaching out to her to figure out where they could get the books. She calls it the “Happy Meal” effect.

At the end of the year after starting the idea of using "treasures" to go along with the books, she discovered that one hundred percent of her students had aced their literacy tests. This solidified the idea that Storybook Treasures was a great idea and set her on the journey to getting a non-profit set up.

She took on a job driving a limousine so that she could pay to start her own non-profit. She was called to make it happen and she made it happen. Her husband couldn’t believe it, because he had just finished telling her that they couldn't use more of the family funds to get it all started.

Throughout it all, Denise has had a can-do attitude and any time she was faced with a challenge, she met it head-on by learning what she needed to learn to allow her to meet her goals.

Where can you find out more about Storybook Treasures?

email:

denise@storybooktreasures.org

Website:

storybooktreasures.org