Awards and Accolades

By: NWP Staff
Publication: The Voice, Vol. 6, No. 2
Date: March-April 2001

Summary: Find out your colleagues' latest awards and publications.

Alabama

Jacksonville State University Writing Project

Ken Guthrie and Sondra Oswalt, 1988 Fellows, and Melissa Shields, 1997 Fellow, received National Board Certification in November 2000.

Millie B. Harris, 1998 Fellow and Advisory Board member, was chosen as Department of Defense Education Activity Teacher of the Year for 2000. Millie will be relieved of her teaching duties at Stowers Elementary, Fort Benning, Georgia, for half a year to travel to various speaking engagements at bases all over the world, including Europe, Japan, Puerto Rico, and the U.S.

Gloria Horton, 1989 Fellow and Co-director, is the Local Arrangements Chair of the National Council of Teachers of English Spring Conference, to be held in Birmingham, Alabama, in March. Gloria currently serves as President of the Alabama Council of Teachers of English.

The Spring 2000 issue of Alabama English, the state NCTE affiliate's journal, features the writing of several teacher-consultants, including articles by Don Bennett, 2000 Fellow, "Autobiographical Writing: Luring the Reluctant Writer"; Barbara Eubanks, 1989 Fellow, "Teacher or Miracle Worker"; and Melissa Shields, 1997 Fellow, "You've Got Mail: A Teacher-Research Class Study." Several others contributed reviews: Joanne Gates, 1997 Fellow, reviewed Weaving in the Women: Transforming the High School English Curriculum; Gloria Horton, 1989 Fellow, reviewed Image Grammar: Using Grammatical Structures to Teach Writing; and Jennifer Ferrell, 1998 Fellow, reviewed The Journal Book for Teachers of At-Risk College Writers.

Arizona

Southern Arizona Writing Project

Nine Fellows contributed chapters to Writing Across the Curriculum in Secondary Classrooms: Teaching from a Diverse Perspective, edited by Harriet Arzu Scarborough (Merrill-Prentice Hall, 2001): (in order of appearance in the book) "Math and Science in My English Class? Why Not?" Anne-Marie Hall, Director; "La Voz Liberada: Writing to Learn in a Sheltered English Class," Salvador Gabaldi; "Writing to Learn as a Way of Making Sense of the World," Mary Carmen E. Cruz; "Real Live Audiences for Real Live Communication: Writing to Learn and the Possibilities of Technology," Loraine Chapman; "A Writing Teacher Learns," Michael Robinson; "Forever on the Morning Wind: Expanding the Canon of American Literature," Edith Baker; "Bridging the Gaps and Spaces Among Learners in a Writing-to-Learn Classroom," Harriet Arzu Scarborough; "Making the Transition from High School to University Writing Across the Curriculum" Yvonne Merrill; and "Rearranging Desks," Alyson Isabel Whyte.

Arkansas

Northwest Arkansas Writing Project

Tim McGinn, 1997 Fellow and an instructor at Northwest Arkansas Community College, was recently elected the Vice President of the Two Year Caucus of the Associated Writing Programs.

Samuel Totten, Director, had four chapters ("The Significance of Rationale Statements in Developing a Sound Holocaust Education Program," "Using Primary Documents in a Study of the Holocaust," "Incorporating First-Person Accounts into a Study of the Holocaust," and "Incorporating Fiction and Poetry into a Study of the Holocaust at the Secondary Level") published in the book Teaching and Studying the Holocaust, which he co-edited with Stephen Feinberg, Director of Outreach Education at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

California

Bay Area Writing Project

Awele Makeba, Oakland Reading Language Arts Specialist, Storyteller, award-winning recording artist (her CD Tell That Tale Again! received a 1999 Parent's Choice Silver Honor award), and playwright, is Storyteller-in-Residence for the Oakland Museum of California and has been commissioned to write and perform the Queen Calafia Storytelling Series featuring stories of the African-American presence in California. She is a workshop facilitator for KQED's Ready To Read Project and a featured storyteller in the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign (Gen. Barry McCaffrel, Director). Her work can be seen at www.awele.com.

Central Los Angeles Writing Project

Carolyn R. Frank, Director, has co-authored a piece with Carol N. Dixon and Lois R. Brandts, Co-directors of the South Coast Writing Project, entitled "Bears, Trolls, and Pagemasters: Learning about Learners in Book Clubs," which appeared in the February issue of The Reading Teacher.

Central California Writing Project

Four CCWP Fellows received National Board Certification in November 2000: Lauren Hesse, 1983 Fellow from New Brighton Middle School; Pam Randall, 1998 Fellow from Del Mar Elementary; Cathy Rosen, 1998 Fellow from Moss Landing Middle School; and Marsha Thompson, 1983 Fellow from New Brighton Middle School.

Great Valley Writing Project

Carol Minner, 1983 Bay Area WP Fellow and Assistant Inservice Coordinator for GVWP and Co-director of the summer invitational, was named Teacher of the Year by California League of Middle Schools, Region 6.

San Joaquin Valley Writing Project

Laurie Goodman, 1995 Fellow and Associate Director, was named Kings County 2000 Teacher of the Year. She is an eighth grade teacher at Pioneer Middle School in Hanford.

South Coast Writing Project

Kathryn Anders, 1999 Fellow, was awarded the Team Teach 2000 Award by USA Today for outstanding teaching. She was selected as one of the top 40 teachers nationwide. Kathryn presently teaches at Calabasas High School in Calabasas California.

Leslie Gravitz, 1995 Fellow, was awarded a Care and Share Philanthropy Grant for her project titled "Joining Our Senior Citizens," by the Santa Barbara Foundation and the Teachers Network, Santa Barbara County IMPACT II, in February 2001. Leslie presently teaches at Main School in Carpinteria, California.

Peggy Kelly, 1997 Fellow, was awarded a Team Coaching Grant for her project titled, "Cross-Curricular Approach to Learning," by the Teachers Network, Santa Barbara County IMPACT II, in February 2001. Peggy presently teaches at Santa Ynez Union High School in Santa Ynez, California.

Marsha Ota, 1995 Fellow, and Alexandra Tashma, 1992 Fellow, were awarded a Team Coaching Grant for their project titled "Making Homework Work," by the Teachers Network, Santa Barbara County IMPACT II, in February 2001. Marsha and Alexander presently teach at Canalino Elementary School in Carpinteria, California.

District of Columbia

District of Columbia Area Writing Project

Barbara Graham, 1997 Fellow, received a grant from The Washington Post for her project, "Textbook Internet Club." Barbara is English Department Chairperson at Phelps Vocational High School.

Annie Harding and Sharon Quick, 2000 Fellows, and their students were featured in the Washington Afro-American for the premier screening of "Teen Health News: A Video Magazine." Sharon and Annie developed this innovative news magazine with their students as a special project for the School of Communications at Roosevelt Senior High School.

Sandra Jenkins, 1998 Fellow, was selected by the Center for Civic Education to participate in the First Annual Center for Civic Education Professional Development Institute, School Violence Prevention Demonstration Program in Manhattan Beach, CA, from February 24–March 2, 2001. Sandra teaches science at Stuart-Hopson Middle School.

Loretta Kelly, 1997 Fellow, and her students were featured in the Washington Times column "Class Act" for their project that used newspapers to research, write about, and analyze the contributions of former DCPS Superintendent Arlene Ackerman. Loretta teaches English at Coolidge Senior High School.

Lohengrin "Gwen" Nix, 1996 Fellow, was appointed to the Teachers' Advisory Board for Action, a student magazine.

Diane Riley, 2000 Fellow, was appointed as the representative of the Association for Childhood Education to the Alliance for Curriculum Reform.

Idaho

Northwest Inland Writing Project

Rachel Lyon, 1994 Fellow, received National Board Certification in November 2000.

Kentucky

Louisville Writing Project

Sherry Ederheimer (LWP XII), former LWP Assistant Director, was chosen as one of 10 Breadloaf Fellows sponsored by the Kentucky Department of Education. She spent the summer in Vermont and is working on ways to network with other writing teachers during this school year.

David Green (LWP VI) and Candy Thomas (LWP XII) earned National Board Certification in November 2000.

Louisiana

National Writing Project of Acadiana

Paul Butler, TC, published a review of Kathleen E. Welch's Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy in the June 2000 issue of Journal of College Writing (June 2000), and an article entitled "Toward a Pedagogy of Writing Immersion: Using Imitation in the Composition Classroom" in the June 2001 issue. He won first place in the graduate research essay category of the LACC Writing Competition 2000.

Maine

Maine Writing Project

Gayla LaBreck, 1997 Fellow and Board member, earned National Board Certification in November 2000.

Jeff Wilhelm, Director; Tanya Baker, Co-director and 1997 Fellow; and Julie Dube, 1997 Fellow, have just published Strategic Reading: Guiding Adolescents to Lifelong Literacy (Heinemann/Boynton-Cook).

Maryland

Maryland Writing Project

Dr. Margaret Musgrove, 1991 Fellow, has just published a new children's book, The Spider Weaver: The Legend of Kente Cloth. Her first children's book, Ashanti to Zulu, won the 1977 Caldecott Medal.

Michigan

Eastern Michigan Writing Project

Rebecca Sipe, Co-director, and Dawn Putnam, 1997 Fellow, co-authored an article, "Virtually Being There: Creating Authentic Experiences Through Interactive Exchanges," English Journal, 90(2), November 2000, pp. 104-111. Rebecca also published "Innovations with Staying Power," English Leadership Quarterly, 22(2), October 1999. This article received an award as the best article on leadership in 1999 at the NCTE 2000 Conference on English Leadership.

Sarah Lorenz, 1997 Fellow, had two articles published in 2000: "Senior Projects and School Reform: Making Changes that Reform a School," Classroom Leadership, 3(7), April 2000; and "Professional Whining," Kappan, December 2000.

An article written by Cathy Fleischer, Co-director, and Julie King, 1995 Fellow and Teacher Coordinator for Professional Development, along with Kathleen Hayes-Parvin, titled "Becoming Proactive: The Quiet Revolution" was published in Voices from the Middle, March, 1999. It was selected to be reprinted in Trends and Issues in Elementary Language Arts, 2000 Edition, a compilation of the best articles on elementary and middle school teaching published by NCTE in the previous year.

Oakland Writing Project

Sharon Galley, 1993 Fellow and Co-director, had an article, "Portfolio as Mirror: Student and Teacher Learning Reflected Through the Standards," published in the November 2000 issue of Language Arts.

Laura Roop, 1985 Fellow and Director, published "Surprising Ourselves: Toward Truly Democratic Literacies and Methodologies" in the January 2001 issue of English Education.

Laura Schiller, 1992 Fellow and Co-director, recently published a chapter entitled "Politics, Pedagogy, and Professional Development in Michigan" in Coping with Standards, Tests, and Accountability: Voices from the Classroom, NEA 2000. Laura and her Southfield colleagues also published "Standards-Based Reform in Literacy: Whose Story Is It?" in the Winter 2001 issue of Michigan Reading Journal. Laura was awarded a Rackham fellowship for doctoral work at The University of Michigan.

Red Cedar Writing Project

Nancy Patterson, 1995 Fellow, published an article entitled "Just the Facts: Research and Theory about Grammar Instruction in the Classroom" in Voices from the Middle, March 2001.

Marianne Peel Forman, 1998 Fellow, published her poem "Black Lung" in the spring 2000 Language Arts Journal of Michigan. In addition, several of her poems have been accepted for publication in a new companion book to Reviving Ophelia, entitled Ophelia's Mom, and in the new international version of the book Mother Voices.

Missouri

Gateway Writing Project

Ethical Issues in Practitioner Research, edited by former Gateway Writing Project Director Jane Zeni for Teachers College Press, 2001, includes chapters by Gateway Writing Project TCs Wanda Clay, Rosalynde Scott, Myrtho Prophete, Nancy Cason, and Minnie Phillips; Co-director Michael Lowenstein; and Marian Mohr and Cathy Beck, TCs from other NWP sites. Susan Lytle of the Philadelphia Writing Project contributed the foreword. Jane Zeni currently teaches at the University of Missouri, St. Louis. The book looks at some of the ethical dilemmas that arise when teachers research their own practice but that are usually ignored by courses and textbooks on research methods.

Rhode Island

Rhode Island Writing Project

The Rhode Island Writing Project (RIWP) was awarded a Rhode Island Foundation Grant that will pay the members of the Executive Board stipends for assuming responsibility in various areas.

The Rhode Island State Senate awarded the RIWP a grant for the first time. RIWP was also awarded a grant from the Rhode Island Office of Higher Education, which will be used to pay the keynote speakers of a two-day Children's Literature Conference for teachers grades K-16. The conference will be jointly sponsored with a variety of other professional organizations for teachers, as well as Rhode Island College.

South Carolina

Lowcountry Writing Project

Debi Dye, 1992 Fellow of the former Charleston Area WP and current Steering Committee member, and Lisa Rudd, TC, received National Board Certification in November 2000.

Swamp Fox Writing Project

Michelle Davis, TC, received National Board Certification.

Susan Rae, TC, is Southside Middle School Teacher of the Year and an Honor Roll Teacher for her district. Her Teacher-of-the-Year packet will be entered in the state-level competition.

Vermont

National Writing Project in Vermont

Geof Hewitt, Co-director, published a book of poetry, Only What's Imagined (Calais, VT: The Kumquat Press, 2000).

Patricia McGonegal, Director, published a chapter, "Vermont's Standards and the Teacher Adventure," in Coping with Standards, Tests, and Accountability: Voices From the Classroom, eds. Allan A. Glatthorn and Jean Fontana (Washington, DC: NEA, 2000).

Do you have news of an award or accolade to share about yourself, a colleague, or your site? If so, submit your news to: Editors—The Voice, National Writing Project, 615 University Hall #1040, Berkeley, CA 94720-1040, or email us at editors@nwp.org.
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