"Citizen-Scholars": How One School Is Reforming a Writing Curriculum

• In Event: Repositioning Criticality in the Writing and Literacies Classroom

Abstract

Realizing optimal learning conditions cannot be addressed by a single entity (Corrigan, 2000), we conducted an engaged scholarship study (Van De Ven, 2007) focused on writing reform in an “underperforming” high school. Across three years’ time, we witnessed the transformation of teachers as they participated in sustained professional development, collaboration, and examination of their practices. Additionally, students demonstrated growth in writing skills on multiple measures. Thus, we found the process of developing shared research and knowledge with a literacy coach and English teachers to bring about success in enacting writing reform. Echoing the conference theme, in this study we examine engaged scholarship as a powerful means of becoming “citizens of the places in which scholarship is produced, disseminated, and implemented.” 

Authors

• Mellinee K. Lesley, Texas Tech University

• Amy Higgins, Lubbock Independent School District

• Whitney Lynn Baker-Beach, Texas Tech University

• Elizabeth Stewart, Texas Tech University