NC State receives record-breaking $12M grant to help teachers improve students' reading skills
A North Carolina State University literacy program has received a three-year, $12.26 million grant from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction to help teachers in high-need school districts teach children to read. It is the largest grant faculty members at N.C. State's College of Education have received since records have been kept, according to the college.
Posted — UpdatedThe new three-year grant will allow Wolfpack WORKS to expand its support to include all third-year K-2 teachers in partner school districts, in addition to first- and second-year teachers. This will bring the number of beginning teachers the program is expected to serve up from 170 to more than 240. The three-year timeline also includes expanded plans to evaluate the program’s impact on participating teachers’ early literacy knowledge and practice and their students’ reading achievement in the short- and long-term.
“About 60 percent of North Carolina’s fourth graders read at a proficient level; we want all fourth graders reading at a proficient level because we know how important early literacy is to lifelong success and opportunity," Mary Ann Danowitz, dean of the NC State College of Education, said in a statement. "We also know that essential to improving early literacy is improving classroom instruction, which is exactly what Wolfpack WORKS does.”
The Wolfpack WORKS’ project team is working with colleagues from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction and literacy research and teacher education experts to develop 10 evidence-based literacy practices that guided the development of Wolfpack WORKS. The program incorporates blended professional development, literacy-specific coaching and resources that beginning K-2 teachers need to implement effective literacy instruction in their classrooms.
The team includes principal investigators Jill Grifenhagen, assistant professor of literacy education at NC State, Ann Harrington, teaching associate professor of reading education, and Paola Sztajn, associate dean for research and innovation.
“We want to continue to work with beginning teachers through their third year in a tiered model of support, as our current participants learn to become stronger early literacy educators,” Grifenhagen said. “Through this sustained support, we hope to build a leadership pipeline of teacher leaders that will stay in their districts and become early literacy instructional leaders in their schools and communities.”
Wolfpack WORKS employs 20 literacy coaches who work weekly with the beginning teachers either in-person or online. The program also provides focused professional development workshops online and face-to-face, and reading interventionists help the beginning teachers manage reading assessments and implement reading interventions in classrooms.
“Our Wolfpack WORKS literacy coaches have been accomplishing so much with the beginning teachers with whom they have been working. They are seeing many positive changes in the teachers' classroom literacy instruction,” Harrington said. “The teachers with whom we are working are required to implement a variety of literacy programs in their respective districts. Our coaches have learned ways to help the teachers implement these programs and provide additional instruction designed to meet the literacy needs of the children in these classrooms.”
The $12.26 million grant tops a previous four-year, $10.8 million grant N.C. State's College of Education received last summer from the John M. Belk Endowment to establish the Belk Center for Community College Leadership and Research.
“Our faculty have now received two grants exceeding $10 million in less than a year to support projects that work to improve educational outcomes for all North Carolinians,” Danowitz said. “These grants are the result of our faculty and staff’s tireless dedication and commitment to our land-grant mission. I also think these grants reflect confidence in the NC State College of Education’s ability to address critical statewide problems like early literacy.”
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