CARSON, Calif. (Wednesday, March 27, 2013) - The Home Depot Center Charitable Foundation and The LA Galaxy Foundation announced today that Annalee Avenue Elementary School in Carson, Calif., has been selected as the winner of the 2013 Reading Garden Challenge and will have a Reading Garden built on their campus. Students from Annalee Avenue Elementary School logged 54,504 reading minutes during the 30 day period to win the reading garden for their school.

The Reading Garden Challenge called for schools and students (grades K-5) to focus on Earth Day (April 22, 2013) as part of their literacy efforts by reading (or being read to) Earth Day-themed books for 30 minutes a day for 30 days (February 14-March 15, 2013) and log their minutes. The Reading Garden will be built on April 22nd (Earth Day) and April 23rd with volunteers from the Galaxy, The Home Depot Center, The Home Depot and the American Heart Association Teaching Gardens.

As a supporter of the Reading Garden Challenge for the past five years, The Home Depot will provide the supplies needed to build the reading garden for Annalee Avenue Elementary School. Activities provided by the American Heart Association Teaching Gardens and will teach the students how to plant seeds, nurture growing plants, harvest produce and ultimately understand the value of good eating habits by building a vegetable garden within the Reading Garden. Students and volunteers will be treated to lunch by Salt Creek Grille on the day of the build.

For more information on the Reading Garden Challenge and to view images from last year’s Reading Garden at Chapman Elementary School, please visit the About/Charitable Foundation section of The Home Depot Center’s official website, homedepotcenter.com. For additional information about the Challenge and how you can participate, please contact Tamala Lewis, The Home Depot Center Charitable Foundation & Community Affairs Director, at (310) 630-2053.

About The Home Depot Center
The Home Depot Center is southern California’s home of world-class competition and training facilities for amateur, Olympic, collegiate and professional athletes. The $150-million, privately-financed Home Depot Center is owned by AEG and operated by AEG Facilities, an international sports, entertainment and venue organization that works with more than 100 of the world’s most elite facilities across the globe. The Home Depot Center is a 125-acre multi-sport complex that sits on the campus of California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) and features an 8,000-seat tennis stadium, a 27,000-seat stadium for soccer and other athletic competitions and outdoor concerts, a 2,000-seat facility for track & field and a 2,450-seat indoor Velodrome for track cycling. The Home Depot Center is home to two Major League Soccer teams, the Los Angeles Galaxy and Chivas USA. Named an Official U.S. Olympic Training Site, The Home Depot Center is also home of the United States Tennis Association’s (USTA) High Performance Training Center, the national team training headquarters for the U.S. Soccer Federation (USSF) and Athletes’ Performance, an international training center for elite and professional athletes. For more information, please visit www.homedepotcenter.com.

--www.homedepotcenter.com on the campus of www.csudh.edu--