by Carrie Healey | May 29, 2014 at 9:56 AM

Var Burton, host of the children’s educational program Reading Rainbow, started aKickstarter campaign yesterday with colleagues to create an interactive online version of the reading program for kids everywhere and to help schools in need.

The goal of $1 million was reached in just 11 hours.

Burton hosted the show since its beginning on PBS in 1983 until it went off the air in 2009 and recently helped launch the Reading Rainbow application for tablets.

The Kickstarter campaign says they would like to be on the internet, not just in an app, so the program is accessible to more children.

With the first $1 million, Reading Rainbow could be placed in over 1,500 classrooms for free.

New extended goals will be released for donations past their original goal, said CEO and writer/director of Reading Rainbow Mark Wolfe in an update.

The 35 day campaign still has 34 days left.

As of Thursday morning, the Kickstarter campaign had raised over $1.7 million with over 37,900 backers who had donated.

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