National Writing Project Summary
(The following summary has been compiled from the NWP Annual Report 2002 and “Profiles of the National Writing Project” as well as additional sources where indicated.)
Goals of NWP:
•To improve student writing and learning in kindergarten through university classrooms
•To extend the uses of writing in all disciplines
•To provide schools, colleges and universities with an effective professional development model
•To identify, celebrate and enhance the professional role of successful classroom teachers
History and Facts:
•Federally funded and NCLB approved provider of professional development
•Founded at UC Berkeley in 1974
•Includes 189 sites in 50 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands
•Encompasses grades K-16, all disciplines
•Serves over 100,000 teachers every year
•Served over 2 million teachers to date
How the Model Works:
•Each site offers an intensive institute every summer and invites distinguished local teachers of writing from all grade levels, K-university, to attend.
•The institute focuses on these teachers, examining their exemplary classroom practices, supporting their work with research studies, and encouraging them to develop their own writing.
•These teachers become the teachers of other teachers during the school year, credible as mentors because they come directly from their own classrooms to lead professional development workshops.
How the Model is Different:
•NWP professional development takes place over time as opposed to “one-shot” programs.
•It is responsive to local needs because local expert teachers are the instructors.
•Because universities host writing project sites, the project also fosters ongoing collaboration among university and K-12 faculty.
•Local writing project teachers become leaders of academic-year programs for their colleagues. Programs such as in-service workshops, school partnerships, classroom coaching, and study groups.
Student Achievement Results:
•After a six-week summer school session for at-risk, low-income students in Mississippi, 1,500 students taught by NWP trained teachers, showed a combined gain from pre- to post-test of 3 years, 4 months: 1 year, 9 months in mathematics and 1 year, 7 months in reading.
•According to a 1990 study by UCLA, students of writing project teachers scored an average of 41% higher on holistically scored writing samples than students of non-writing project teachers.
•Results of a 1992-93 study showed that students whose teachers participated in the Writing Teachers’ Consortium, a staff development program conducted by the NYC Writing Project and Lehman College, achieved significantly higher scores in reading than comparison group students.
•From 1995 to 1998, the Northern California Writing Project provided more than 100 hours of in-service focused on early literacy and the reading-writing connection for a group of 2nd grade teachers. STAR test results of second grade students at their school scored 56% higher in reading, 38% higher in language, and 47% higher in spelling than the comparison group of second-graders from a neighboring school.
•At the University of Southwestern Louisiana, first-year students who were taught by writing project teachers in at least three English classes in middle and high school consistently placed in higher level composition courses and achieved better grades than their college peers who had never had a writing project teacher.
•A Title I school in Connecticut rose from the lowest scoring to the highest scoring middle school in the district after a year-long writing project staff development program for all teachers at the school in 1995-96.
Why Writing:
•Writing is central to academic success
According to U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Remedial Education at Higher Education Institutions in Fall 1995, universities must provide remedial writing education for an increasing number of students, particularly schools with high minority enrollment.
•Writing is central in the workplace
Lack of writing skills affects both individual and corporate success. According to the National Institute for Literacy, “Literacy Practices in Today’s Workplace,” high percentages of workers report that they frequently write on the job yet only 26% of companies offer the necessary training.
•Writing is central to the economy
48% of adult Americans demonstrated literacy skills in the lowest two levels on the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey and nearly 50% of all adults performing in the lowest level of literacy were living in poverty.
•Writing is central to standards in all disciplines
Writing is a key component in national, state, and district standards. Students are required to use writing to predict, explain, persuade, and problem solve in all disciplines, particularly on current national standards-based assessments.
•Writing is central to the teaching of reading
Numerous studies have shown that reading development does not take place in isolation; children develop simultaneously as readers, listeners, speakers, and writers.
Why Albuquerque:
•According to the APS website, schools that did not meet adequate yearly progress on national assessments jumped from 22% to 32% between 2003-04 and 2004-05.
•Based on 2005 standard-based assessment scores at the same site, 48% of Albuquerque’s 4th graders and 55% of 8th graders are below proficient in Language Arts.
•According to April 2004 NM Association of Community Colleges Report, 67% of incoming recent high school graduates need some sort of remediation and only 69% of new students complete their first year of college.
•According to NM Coalition for Literacy, 20% of New Mexicans ages 16 and older have literacy skills at level one, slightly higher than the national average.
Other Sites in New Mexico:
•Borderlands Writing Project, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces
•Four Corners Writing Project, University of New Mexico, Farmington
•High Plains Writing Project, Eastern New Mexico University, Roswell
•Bisti Writing Project, San Juan College, Farmington
NWP Board of Directors
Dan Boggan, Jr.--Consultant to Siebert Brandford Shank & Co. L.L.C., Oakland, CA
Michele T. Drake--Public Relations Manager, Agilent Technologies Inc., Palo Alto, CA
Donald Gallehr--Director, Northern Virginia Writing Project, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA
James Gray--Founder, National Writing Project, Berkeley, CA
George P. Haley--Partner, Pillsbury Winthrop LLP, San Francisco, CA
Augusta Souza Kappner--President, Bank Street College of Education, New York, NY
Donald McQuade--Vice Chancellor, University Relations, University of California, Berkeley, CA
David Meyerowitz--President and CEO, Strategic Capital Corporation, Toronto, ON
Denise Patmon--Associate Professor, Graduate College of Education, University of Massachusetts, Boston, MA
John S. Reed--Interim Chairman and CEO, New York Stock Exchange, New York, NY
Richard Sterling--Executive Director, National Writing Project, Berkeley, CA
Vanessa Whang--Arts/Philanthropy Consultant; Program Director, LINC/Artography, New York, NY
Additional Research
A Survey of Business Leaders:
As per the College Board Report September 2004 National Commission on Writing for America’s Families, Schools, and Colleges—Writing: A Ticket to Work…Or a Ticket Out
•Writing is a “threshold skill” for both employment and promotion, particularly for salaried employees. Half the responding companies report that they take writing into consideration when hiring professional employees.
•People who cannot write and communicate clearly will not be hired and are unlikely to last long enough to be considered for promotion.
•Two-thirds of salaried employees in large American companies have some writing responsibility.
•Eighty percent or more of the companies in the service and finance, insurance, and real estate sectors, the corporations with the greatest employment-growth potential, assess writing during hiring.
•Half of all companies take writing into account when making promotion decisions.
•More than 40 percent of responding firms offer or require training for salaried employees with writing deficiencies. Based on the survey response, it appears that remedying deficiencies in writing may cost American firms as much as $3.1 billion annually.
A Writing Agenda for the Nation
As per the College Board Report April 2003 National Commission on Writing in America’s Schools and Colleges, The Neglected “R”: A Need for Writing Revolution
•Higher education should address the special roles it has to play in improving writing. All prospective teachers, no matter their discipline, should be provided with courses in how to teach writing. Meanwhile, writing instruction in colleges and universities should be improved for all students.
•States and the federal government should provide the financial resources necessary for the additional time and personnel required to make writing a centerpiece in the curriculum.
•Common expectations about writing should be developed across disciplines through in-service workshops designed to help teachers understand good writing and develop as writers themselves.
•Universities should advance common expectations by requiring all prospective teachers to take courses in how to teach writing. Teachers need to understand writing as a complex (and enjoyable) form of learning and discovery, both for themselves and for their students. Faculty in all disciplines should have access to professional development opportunities to help them improve student writing.
•University—school partnerships should encourage greater experimentation and the development of new model programs to improve teaching and learning for English-language learners.
An Action Agenda
To move this national writing agenda forward, the Commission proposes a five-year Writing Challenge for the nation and seeks the support of leaders from education, government, business, and the philanthropic world. The Challenge should issue progress reports, map the terrain ahead, and provide assistance to educators on the many details that remain to be ironed out on topics such as writing assessments and the use of technology.