WHO WE ARE
Saddleback started with a problem my father couldn't ignore.
Thomas Milano spent years teaching high school math in South Philadelphia. His students weren't failing math because they couldn't think. They were failing because they couldn't read the textbooks. So he started finding lower-level materials, anything that would let them access the content without the reading level being the wall. He saw what happened when a kid finally got a book they could actually get through. It changed things.
In 1982, he turned that instinct into a company, running it out of his home office and shipping orders from his garage. The first order was $3.25. He built it anyway.
By the time my husband Tim and I took over in 2009, Saddleback had grown from a 24-page catalog representing other publishers' products into a real educational publisher selling 100% of our own titles. Today, our catalog spans over 1,500 books.
We are still family-owned. We still run on the same values Tom started with. And we still think about the same kid he was thinking about in that South Philadelphia classroom.
WHAT WE DO
More than 60% of American fourth- and eighth-graders read below grade level. On top of that, there are millions of Newcomers, English Language Learners, students with disabilities, and kids who simply never had books in their homes. That's a lot of students who need a different kind of material, and not enough publishers are willing to make it.
We make it.
Saddleback creates high-interest, age-respectful content for grades 4-12, written at accessible reading levels starting as low as Pre-K and going up to fifth grade. The reading level is not a barrier. We offer graphic novels, straight prose, full-color books, books in verse, and plays because the format matters as much as the content when you're trying to reach a reluctant reader.
We live by one simple idea: if you want a child to read a book, give them a book they want to read.
That's what my father figured out in South Philadelphia. It's what we're still doing today.
Tim and Arianne McHugh, Owners
Saddleback Educational Publishing