Alabama is leading the way to raising literacy rates one child at a time, “one more little light bulb going off every day,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings at the second Governor’s Reading Summit Sept. 15 at Shades Mountain Baptist Church, Vestavia Hills.
“It seems appropriate that we are having this summit in a church where I am sure many revivals have taken place — we are having epiphanies every day on how to read in Alabama,” Spellings said.
The venue is also appropriate because Alabama Baptist churches have been giving rise to these reading revivals for several years, said Joe Morton, Alabama Superintendent of Education.
“The churches have been fabulous — some of our strongest partners,” he said. “Churches have held training sessions for free, some even giving us back the cleaning fee we offered them for the use of their buildings.”
Why is the generosity bridging the gap of separation of church and state? Because the Alabama Reading Initiative (ARI), a program designed to train teachers to teach reading more effectively, is something both believe in, Morton said.
“I believe with all my heart that failing to teach children to read on grade level is a sin,” he said. “We can beat illiteracy and God will be given the glory.”
ARI began as a grassroots effort to tackle the state’s dismal literacy ratings. At that time, Alabama was consistently ranking 48th, 49th or 50th in the nation, or on a more personal note, in 1997, one in three children could not read on grade level. It was that year with the motivation of that statistic that officials put plans in motion to pilot the program in a handful of schools, Morton said.
Alabama kicked the program off with $1.5 million in funding in 16 schools dubbed “the sweet 16.” Now the program runs on $56 million in about 750 schools, with every elementary school in the state either receiving training already or signed up to train this summer.
“The future of Alabama hinges on whether or not we teach our children to read,” Gov. Bob Riley told the approximately 600 school teachers and administrators, politicians and other supporters gathered at the summit.
“We have the opportunity to change the lives of children and open up a new perception of the state of Alabama,” he said.
Children such as some of the students at Hemphill Elementary School in Birmingham have already seen such a change.
Hemphill Elementary, which is 98 percent minority, has 95 percent of its students on reduced or free lunch programs and once was full of struggling readers. It was a school “we made excuses for” for years, Riley said.
But after the introduction of ARI, the school’s reading scores tied those of the lauded public elementary schools of Mountain Brook and Homewood, he said. “There’s intensity and passion there now (because of ARI), and anywhere I go where the initiative is being used, I experience that same kind of passion,” Riley noted.
In ARI schools, discipline problems and special education enrollment are decreasing, reading levels are rising and teachers are teaching differently and more effectively, Morton said.
“It’s (a project) on a massive scale, and it hasn’t been easy but we celebrate the results.”
Teachers involved in ARI training receive strategies for reading instruction and tools to help encourage comprehension. They are also taught how to effectively intervene with struggling readers.
“It’s a personal approach — we don’t train the teachers in large settings like this,” said Katherine Mitchell, Alabama assistant superintendent of education for reading, as she gestured to the large crowd present at the summit. “We teach them in small classrooms in small groups so they can really work and get the material down.”
A five-day Alabama Reading Academy is offered for teachers through ARI, and regional trainers are also available to go in and offer one-on-one support for teachers. Trainers can even team-teach with teachers in their classrooms to help model the strategies if requested to do so.
All of this is provided by state and private funding and also by good neighbors like Alabama Baptist churches, Mitchell said.
“We proved ourselves the first year on donated funds, and to be good stewards with the funds that have been given to us through the years, we have turned to churches for help. They have been gracious enough to let us train in their facilities for no cost,” she said.
Shades Mountain Baptist, as well as Eastmont Baptist Church, Montgomery, were recognized at the summit along with three churches from other denominations for exceptional help with ARI.
The help of everyone is needed to make the initiative successful and make a difference in the lives of students, Riley said, adding that in five years — with the right intensity — Alabama can be in the top five in the nation’s literacy ratings.
Reading is the “new civil right,” said Spellings, the architect of the No Child Left Behind Act, the Bush administration’s policy designed to close achievement gaps between different groups of students.
“More progress has been made in literacy in the nation in the last five years than in the 25 years prior to that,” she said. “We are always asking, ‘How are we going to raise scores?’ Alabama is leading the way.”
Some 3,800 students displaced by Hurricane Katrina have been absorbed into the state’s public school system, and their parents can “take comfort knowing they are going to be in the good schools of Alabama,” Spellings said.
All those partnering with ARI are doing a wonderful job, she said, adding that everyone involved should keep up the good work.
“We are a state committed to 100 percent literacy, and other states are looking to our approach as a model,” Morton said.
Through the data-driven ARI material that empowers teachers with content and unprecedented support, he said the state hopes to “create a safe place for children.”
Riley said Alabama has “the best schools, the best teachers and the best students.”
“We need to enhance the enthusiasm as we expand and make sure we don’t lose intensity,” he said. “Every student, every principal and teacher need to take hold and say, ‘We won’t accept mediocrity in education in the state of Alabama.’ If we do that, we can see the state transformed.”
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