NORTHWEST
EDUCATION
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VANCOUVER, Washington—It’s anything but a typical Friday night at the Starbucks in a suburban strip mall. Instead of Generation Y couples sipping lattes and checking e-mail, the café is mobbed with the under-10 set and their parents, celebrating the 50th birthday of Dr. Seuss’s immortal Cat in the Hat.
At center stage is the Cat himself in towering red and white top hat, animatedly reading from the beloved text. Members of the Washington Reading Corps (WRC) dispense free books, bookmarks with reading tips for parents, and slices of blue-frosted cake. Two hours and six gallons of hot chocolate later, another WRC Family Literacy Night draws to a close.
Parents like John McMillan, with his six-year-old daughter in tow, proclaim the event a success. “The kids who come tonight see reading as a positive experience. Their friends are here and they’re having a good time,” he says. Jessica Calderon, a former WRC worker who brought two of her children, agrees: “The best part is it makes kids happy to read and it gets so many different parts of the community involved in literacy.” Starbucks manager Lisa Colbert says she regularly partners with the Reading Corps as a way to connect to families at neighborhood schools.
Promoting literacy, leveraging community resources, and tutoring struggling readers are all part of WRC’s mission. Founded almost a decade ago by Governor Gary Locke and the Washington state legislature, the Reading Corps works in 84 elementary schools across the state and has been replicated around the country. State and federal funds combine to support 230 AmeriCorps and 60 VISTA members who make up the WRC teams.
Serving 8,000 students a year, the Corps’ track record is impressive. According to Program Coordinator Shannon Skye, schools that participated in WRC since 1999 have raised their state reading scores by almost 31 percent, compared to a statewide average of 22 percent. “Three-fourths of the students tutored either met state grade-level standards in reading or gained at least one grade level,” Skye says. “That’s a significant achievement.”
Skye adds that all WRC members get a thorough grounding in the research on how kids learn to read, and they receive further training at their individual sites.
At Vancouver’s Minnehaha Elementary, WRC’s presence is hard to miss. “They are an integral part of keeping our reading program running,” reports Reading Specialist Emmi McLarty. “They’re the cheerleaders for our families, putting on a literacy event every month that can average up to 250 people. They get donations so every kid gets a book and some of our kids say those are the only books they own. And with their help, I have enough volunteers to do one-on-one tutoring.”
McLarty trains and coordinates the four WRC members based at her school. She makes sure they’re fluent in the Read Well® scripted phonics program used in the lower grades and the Houghton Mifflin curriculum that’s found in upper classrooms. The team’s three AmeriCorps members work with youngsters who are reading one to two grade levels below their peers. These small-group sessions have no more than four students and last anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes, four days a week.
In the common area outside a cluster of classrooms, WRC member Nicole Wilson gently instructs three squirmy little boys to read a sentence and then draw a picture. She’s quick to praise their efforts and add big red “smiley faces” to their worksheets.
Wilson, who previously taught in a home for autistic children, plans to earn her master’s in teaching when her 10-month WRC commitment is up. After a packed morning working on leveled reading with kindergarten and first-grade students, she’ll spend her afternoon with small groups of second-graders. These students are two years below grade level and are getting a double dose of Read Well®. “I extend what’s happening in the classroom with games that reinforce vowel sounds or blends. It’s always an interesting task to keep all the kids on the same page because of frequent absences,” she notes. Another part of her afternoon is devoted to helping third-graders prepare for the all-important WASL (Washington Assessment of Student Learning) tests.
Before Wilson’s group scurries back to the classroom, she encourages them to grab a selection from the book exchange—something they can take home and bring back in a few days. “Don’t forget,” she cheerfully reminds Artem, “you can read it to your cat or dog, your mom or dad, or your brother and sister!” Often, she’ll pick out a special book for a child: “It makes a difference when they know someone is paying attention to them.”
Down the hall, in the school’s Learning Center, some three dozen children are getting lots of attention with one-on-one tutoring. The tutors are ninth-graders from nearby Hudson’s Bay High School who come to read with these youngsters every day. WRC member Tom Agnew floats around the bustling room, troubleshooting and making sure the peer tutors follow the lesson plans in students’ folders.
Agnew’s role differs from the rest of the Reading Corps team. As a VISTA worker his job is to hustle up resources and work on program sustainability rather than instructing kids. Agnew comes to the task after 28 years as a school counselor in Virginia. As a recent transplant to Vancouver—where his grandchildren live—he sees this assignment as a great way to get to know his new community.
He starts his day at Minnehaha by greeting kids—usually up to 160—who arrive for breakfast and a morning story time. Then, he’s on the phone recruiting community volunteers and securing donations for literacy events. That can mean everything from raffle prizes to refreshments, books, and even a kiddie rock band.
“Everyone on our team has different talents and there’s a lot of diversity,” he observes, mentioning that one WRC member just graduated from high school, while he himself has a PhD. “In my previous position I had a lot of authority; now, I’m the low person on the stick and I’ve learned from that. I appreciate that everyone has to work together if we’re going to help kids. It’s strengthened my resolve that the community has to be involved in the schools.”
“Tom is out there making contacts in our community and bringing in live bodies,” comments McLarty appreciatively. “He’s developed liaisons with local companies, enlisting their support for our literacy events. In the past, I used to think if we got 30 people at one of these events it would be a good turnout. But this year we’ve been getting 100, 150, and even 275. It’s mind-boggling and I absolutely know it’s a direct result of WRC’s outreach.”
Principal Jackie Merz-Beck acknowledges that her staff simply doesn’t have the time to organize monthly family events. Having a WRC team is like adding four extra staff members, even though it requires “a lot of work on the front end” to orient and train them. She says that one of the reasons the program works so well is that she and McLarty are actively involved in picking people who will be a good fit for the school, where half of the 540 students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. (For more suggestions on working with volunteers, see sidebar at right.)
The WRC team at Minnehaha is one of nine Reading Corps groups administered by Educational Service District 112, which serves six counties in Southwest Washington. “Each school has a literacy specialist who acts as the site supervisor,” explains Project Supervisor Jennifer McFarland. “We try to fit into what’s already happening at the school so we’re not reinventing the wheel.” VISTA Team Leader Brittany Morgan—who sometimes doubles as the Cat in the Hat—says she and McFarland work with Corps members to determine what services schools need most and to make sure that the schools are using members appropriately. And, they also focus on evaluating the Corps’ impact—from tracking the number of readers who no longer need remedial services to surveying parents at literacy events and measuring the effectiveness of volunteer recruitment efforts.
Principal Jackie Merz-Beck can’t say enough good things about the Washington Reading Corps members who tutor struggling readers and marshal volunteers and donations for Minnehaha Elementary. But, she’s learned a few things over the years to make the relationship go smoother:
“These volunteers come in and see things with fresh eyes,” Merz-Beck remarks. “Don’t be afraid to give them responsibility and let them run with it!”
ESD 112—headquartered in a sprawling former industrial warehouse—operates some 300 different programs and services. Besides the region’s WRC tutoring program, the ESD is home to two other innovative projects that draw parents or community partners to the schools.
The newly launched MAP or Mentoring Advanced Placement program matches local business professionals with AP teachers and high school students enrolled in the demanding classes. Mentors and their assigned teachers develop a yearlong plan that parallels the students’ AP curriculum and exam preparation.
The mentors meet two to four times a month with students—and more often by phone or e-mail—to discuss courses, tie classwork to real-world applications, and explore career and college options. So far, the roster of 20 mentors works with close to 100 students in AP physics, calculus, chemistry, statistics, and biology. AP English language and comprehension will be added next year.
High tech executive Scott Keeney dreamed up the program two years ago. “At my 20th high school reunion I was comparing notes with some of my friends on how well-prepared we were for college. We found that we weren’t,” remembers Keeney, head of nLight Photonics, a semiconductor component manufacturer. That conversation prompted Keeney to think about ways to help high school students prepare for the rigors of higher education and for the competitive world beyond. He wound up putting a lot of “sweat equity” into getting MAP off the ground with the help of ESD 112 and the Southwest Washington Workforce Development Council. And, he went several steps further by encouraging his employees to volunteer as mentors, funding a MAP scholarship, and promoting the program to fellow CEOs at the Clark County High-Tech Council.
This year mentors from nLight have been joined by scientists and engineers from Hewlett Packard (HP), Sharp Electronics, Krieger IP, and Underwriters Laboratories. HP engineer Bob Stavig mentors seven physics students, challenging them with tasks like tearing apart an inkjet printer. He frequently travels to Asia on business and says it’s evident the U.S. is falling further and further behind in the technology sector. “I think that’s because we’re not stressing math and science enough,” he says. “I’d like to think that through this program there’ll be a few more engineers who go on to the U.S. marketplace.”
Coordinator Natalie Pacholl, who is employed by ESD 112, believes that MAP is breaking new ground. “There are other science mentoring programs and programs that are geared toward specific groups [such as girls or minorities], but this aims to serve any AP student,” she says. “We hope to challenge high school students to succeed in more rigorous academic subjects and to create future innovations in a global economy.”
Another program at ESD 112 has smaller but no less lofty goals. The Early Childhood Learning pilot, a statewide expansion of the Washington Reading Corps mission, targets the youngest learners. A WRC member works with the Southwest Washington Childcare Consortium at two preschools to build foundational literacy skills through stories, games, and conversation.
In another branch of the program, WRC members help organize weekly group activities for children from birth to age five and their caregivers. These “Read and Play” times focus on developmentally appropriate songs, stories, and movement. They also bring new parents into their neighborhood schools.
“Oftentimes, parents didn’t have a good experience with schools growing up,” notes Program Specialist Joanne Jacobs. “This gets them into the schools, makes them comfortable, and builds relationships with teachers and staff. We hear stories all the time about how the program is helping parents connect with schools before their kids hit kindergarten.”
Like the more-established WRC tutoring program, the early learning pilot tries to communicate to parents the importance of reading for school success. By sowing the seeds of reading readiness early on, Reading Corps members may be lucky enough to some day work themselves out of a job—building strong readers from the very start.
For more information, check out www.esd112.org/wrc/ and www.esd112.org/apmentoring/.
When groups like the Washington Reading Corps need help educating volunteers or attracting mentors, they can turn to two powerful resources at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory. The Laboratory is home to both the National Mentoring Center and the Volunteer Leadership Center (VLC). The two centers offer training and technical assistance—online and face-to-face—to thousands of programs that work in schools and communities around the nation.
Throughout the past decade, VLC has helped Washington Reading Corps (WRC) members develop tutoring skills, build relationships with youth, manage difficult student behavior, work with English language learners, and learn various literacy strategies. “Although our program has a national focus, our proximity to WRC and ESD 112 has allowed us to provide extensive volunteer training in a very cost-effective way,” says Nicky Martin, who directs the VLC’s LEARNS program. “To help build volunteer training capacity across Washington, we’ve worked with VISTA members and WRC key area coordinators so they can deliver our training to others in turn.”
The National Mentoring Center also works on building program capacity. Originally created by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention in the U.S. Department of Justice, the center was designed to assist mentoring program leaders working with at-risk and adjudicated youth. Today mentoring has expanded from the traditional Big Brothers Big Sisters model to faith-based, school-based, group, and e-mentoring programs. “We help people with program structure and management issues, putting practical tools in their hands,” says the center’s Michael Garringer. Those resources include toolkits for starting mentoring programs, policy and procedures manuals, and tips for marketing and sustaining programs.
An estimated 65 million Americans engaged in service activities in 2004–2005. As their number and contributions continue to grow, so will the need for programs like NWREL’s that help them make more of an impact in their communities.
For more information visit the National Mentoring Center at www.nwrel.org/mentoring/index.php and the Volunteer Leadership Center at www.nwrel.org/vlc/.
Original URL: http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/12-03/partner/
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