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Editor’s note: This week, we are continuing a series of guest blogs in which accomplished teachers offer ideas for how to spend stimulus funds. Last week, Heather Wolpert-Gawron and Ariel Sacks shared their thoughts. Today, Mary Tedrow offers her contribution. The opinions she expresses are, of course, her own and do not necessarily represent those of LFA or its member organizations.

True reform happens one student at a time: a single student finally participates in his own learning, reflects on growth, incorporates new knowledge into his life, and uses new knowledge to serve both his immediate needs and the needs of the community. The tool for achieving this revolution already exists but is widely neglected and even undermined by the current emphasis on standardized tests. (see: http://www.writingcommission.org/prod_downloads/writingcom/neglectedr.pdf)

MY PROPOSED STIMULUS INVESTMENT: Spend funds to develop writing across all curricula in all grade levels and in all schools in the nation.

Award stimulus dollars to districts that pursue the placement of at least one writing coach in every building, supported and trained through the Intensive Summer Institute of the National Writing Project. The National Writing Project is “shovel ready” and can accommodate sweeping reform tomorrow if the demand for good writing instruction is supported through policy and funding. The NWP, already supported by the U.S. Department of Education, is currently underutilized at the local level since professional development funding varies from district to district.

The reform wheel will not need to be reinvented if we adopt this stimulus strategy. Numerous studies of the NWP (both longitudinal and content specific) have documented significant gains in student achievement and teacher job satisfaction. Teachers who develop skills through the National Writing Project are more effective and more likely to stay in the profession over the long term, increasing the likelihood that students will be exposed to effective teaching methods.

A strong writing focus brings the following benefits to students:

• Writing creates students who are makers of meaning, rather than passive receivers of knowledge.
• Writing records student thought. The act of writing requires students to engage in and refine thinking.
• Good writing creates good citizens who can voice and support well-considered opinions. 
• Writing is the ultimate tool for student differentiation in all content areas. 
• Writing humanizes instruction, allowing students to mine personal experience to develop subject matter understanding. 
• Writing creates meaningful relationships between teachers and students. 
• Writing instruction enhances reading instruction.

The National Writing Project model has documented benefits that strengthen and enrich the teaching profession – benefits that provide an antidote to teacher shortages. The Project:

• Has a record of encouraging good teachers to stay in the profession. Seventy percent remain in the classroom working with students, while 98% of project teachers have stayed in education their entire careers.
• Develops a strong, well-connected learning community, extending far beyond the initial summer NWP session.
• Impacts school-wide writing programs when a single teacher returns to model professional learning, demonstrate lessons, and provide resources for further study and innovation – all at little or no cost to localities.
• Teachers continue to write and read independently in their professional work, influencing instruction by writing books and articles that draw on classroom experience.
• Teachers expand writing opportunities beyond the school day, often providing summer and weekend enrichment for young writers.

Send a legion of teachers to the Writing Project. When they return, support their new knowledge by providing time, space and materials to enact school-wide writing programs that encourage all students to view themselves not just as readers but also as writers.

We spend billions ensuring that students can read. By making an equally smart investment in writing, we are helping our students make sense of what they’ve read, heard or seen by asking them to use the writing process for deeper thinking.

Mary Tedrow teaches high school English and journalism and co-directs the Northern Virginia Writing Project. She is a National Board Certified Teacher and a past Fellow of the Teacher Leaders Network.