Building New Pathways to Leadership by Innovating Beyond the Traditional Writing Project Model Institute

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Resources in this Collection
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[su_spoiler title=”#StayinTeaching: Pathways to Writing Project Leadership for Early-Career Teachers” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]This narrative and accompanying resources tell one Writing Project site’s story of building a pathway to teacher-leadership for early-career teachers. Site leaders interested in supporting professional growth for new teachers that is more of a collegial welcome to the profession, and the Writing Project, and less remedial instruction, may find this site’s story and approach illuminating. Check it out…
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[su_spoiler title=”Content Literacy Leadership: A Lane Change for Writing Projects” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]Written as part of the Building New Pathways to Leadership initiative, this narrative and accompanying resources tell one site’s story of building a pathway to teacher leadership for civics teachers. Site leaders interested in developing their site’s capacity to deliver professional development for social studies teachers may find this story of investment in the leadership of civics teachers illuminating. Check it out…
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[su_spoiler title=”Creating a Team of Teacher Leaders in Remote Schools and Local Communities: The Yellowstone Writing Project’s New Pathway to Leadership” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]This narrative and accompanying resources tell one Writing Project site’s story of building a pathway to teacher leadership in a remote rural school district. Site leaders interested in supporting teacher-leadership development in remote rural areas of their service area may find this narrative helpful. Check it out…
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[su_spoiler title=”Online Summer Institute: Extending the Invitation” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]This short monograph outlines the development, execution, and refinement of the Morehead Writing Project’s Online Summer Institute over the course of 8 years, including a variety of artifacts and links to the Google Site used to coordinate the institute. Site leaders developing their own online or hybrid summer institute may find this site’s experience useful. Check it out…
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[su_spoiler title=”The Boise State Writing Project’s Science Pathway” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]This website documents the Boise State Writing Project’s year-long Science Pathway, designed to cultivate science teacher-leaders in the Writing Project site and state. Site leaders interested in expanding their site’s content-area specific offerings can see each step of the summer institute and following Fellowship Year, including guidelines for and examples of the variety of writing teachers produced. Check it out…
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[su_spoiler title=”The Northern California Writing Project’s Hybrid Summer Institute Remix” open=”no” style=”default” icon=”plus” anchor=”” class=”collection-nav”]This Piktochart presentation documents the Northern California Writing Project’s creation of a hybrid summer institute as an alternative to the traditional multi-week, face-to-face institute. Site leaders interested in increasing the accessibility and flexibility of their professional development offerings may find inspiration and ideas from this presentation, documenting the NCWP’s story and approach and filled with flyers, agendas, video clips, and other artifacts. Check it out…
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At virtually all NWP sites, the Invitational Leadership Institute stands as the signature program and entryway for strong practitioners to become part of the local site. But at every site, there are strong educators who by virtue of geography or position or life circumstance are not able to take advantage of the site’s traditional offerings. Yet their leadership would be valued and the participation would help expand the impact of the site far beyond its current boundaries.

So, how do sites reinvent their leadership institutes to engage these potential leaders with a view toward maintaining the power and scope of their original Invitational Institute model?

The resources collected here provide powerful examples of how six Writing Project sites created new designs that go beyond their traditional Writing Project summer institute model to reach new groups of teachers not well-served by that model. Whether using online tools and innovative scheduling to overcome problems of distance; creating supports and programs specifically for early-career teachers; or taking advantage of new writing standards to invite content area teachers into the Writing Project, these resources provide detailed examples of the kind of planning, execution, iteration, and learning that takes place when Writing Project sites adapt their programs to build new pathways to teacher leadership.

These six projects were developed as part of the broader Building New Pathways to Leadership (BNPL) initiative, supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The initiative served to create new ways to scale our work and reach underserved teachers, as funding challenges render the classic model of establishing new university-based sites inadequate. The initiative also supported the development of this Write/Learn/Lead Knowledge Base and the articulation of the NWP Social Practices framework, which mades explicit six key practices of NWP-style teacher leadership.

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