A new program at Bowling Green City Schools pairs high school athletes with elementary classrooms.

Stacey Higgins, second grade teacher at Crim Elementary, and Michele Wolf, athletic director shared the program with the board of education at Tuesday’s meeting.

The 2nd & 7 Foundation promotes reading by providing free books and positive role models to kids in need while encouraging young athletes of the community to pay it forward.

“Some of our buildings had been involved pretty sporadically with teams from BGSU over the years, and then COVID hit,” Higgins said.

Those collaborations shut down, she said.

Higgins then became aware of a collaboration with high schools athletes. She approached Wolf last year and got the program off the ground.

2nd & 7 is designed for buildings with high socio-economic needs. Both Crim and Kenwood elementaries qualified, but since the district is small enough, the foundation allowed the inclusion of Conneaut Elementary, Higgins said.

The foundation has its own book series called “The Hog Mollies,” which follows a group of friends on adventures in their community. They learn life lessons and social and emotional skills, such as teamwork, healthy choices, diversity and respect.

Higgins said hog mollies are oversized football offensive linemen.

Each book focuses on a specific theme, and each second grade student gets a copy of the book.

Wolf said for each visit, 20-24 high school athletes were sent to the elementaries.

“The coolest part is we focused on our varsity captains, so they were mostly seniors and a lot of juniors,” Wolf said.

“We always had enough volunteers to visit each of the second grade classrooms,” Higgins said.

A few books are tied into community spaces, including the library.

“The second graders love it when their high school athletes come,” Higgins said. “They are just so excited to see the future.”

During each visit, the student-athletes share their background. They then read a selected “Hog Mollies” book, lead the class discussion and help students with the book activities.

Freshman Calla Higgins said the best part was talking about the sports she participates in and how the younger students look up to the athletes.

The student-athletes have asked to visit the schools more often and do more activities with the second graders, Stacey Higgins said.

The district received four books this year, so student-athletes made four visits, she said.

“As a teacher, we really like having the athletes come back into our building,” Higgins said.

Kisha Nichols, a second grade teacher at Kenwood, said her favorite part was seeing former students come back into her classroom.

2nd & 7 was started in 1999 by three former Ohio State Buckeye football players — Ryan Miller, Luke Fickell and Mike Vrabel. Inspired by their involvement in various community outreach programs as student-athletes, they decided to continue to pay it forward by promoting literacy and providing positive role models for children in central Ohio.

That first year, they provided free books to all of the 2nd graders in seven schools and that is how 2nd & 7 got its name.

“We just really think this is a program that we want to try to nurture and continue,” Higgins said.

The program is offered at no cost to the district.

Wolf said she got a testimonial from parents who had a senior son participating in 2nd & 7. They heard him talking in his room and discovered he was reading a children’s book — he was practicing reading the book for the second graders.

“I thought that was pretty cute,” Wolf said.