Resource Topics
Professional Development - NWP Model - Continuity
Additional Resources
Tampa Bay Tech Institute Guided by Wisdom of NWP Network
May 2011
Joe Bellino
The Tampa Bay Area Writing Project's inaugural advanced technology institute benefited from the expertise of teachers in the Technology Liaisons Network and the NWP network.
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A Michigan Site Helps Teachers Reach a Writing Crossroads
May 2011
Jenny Orton
Jenny Orton, a teacher-consultant with the Crossroads Writing Project in Michigan, discusses how her site continues to improve its dual-retreat model to help teachers take time from their daily lives and reignite their commitment to writing.
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Envisioning Leadership Transitions as Moments of Opportunity
April 2011
Karen Hamlin, director of the Oregon Writing Project at Willamette University, reflects on how the site's visioning retreat—inspired by the NWP Directors Retreat—enabled it to achieve a balance between dreaming big and building site capacity to meet the needs of its service area.
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Writing Project Principles at the Heart of San Diego School
February 2011
Art Peterson
Teacher-consultants from the San Diego Area Writing Project have opened a charter school that emphasizes writing across the curriculum, teachers teaching teachers, and a commitment to equity and social justice.
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Continuity in Action: How Sites Extend the Summer Institute
January 2011
Writing Project sites offer a range of opportunities for teacher-consultants to extend and deepen the work of the professional community beyond the invitational summer institute. The following resources offer glimpses into a rich variety of continuity opportunities at local sites.
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NWP Radio—What Does Continuity Look Like at Your Site?
December 2010
The NWP model for local sites focuses on invitational summer institutes, professional development programs, and continuity. But what exactly is continuity and why is it so central to the vitality of NWP sites?
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Writing for the Public: Teacher Editorializing as a Pathway to Professional Development
October 2010
Jonna Perrillo
Jonna Perrillo, director of the West Texas Writing Project, explores the benefit to teachers, schools, and the community of her Editorial Project, which provides a pathway for teachers to move from classroom questions to published editorials.
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Navigating the Tensions in Designing a Professional Writing Retreat
July 2010
Susan Martens-Baker, Robert Petrone
Two Nebraska Writing Project facilitators share their process of navigating tensions as they developed their site's first professional writing retreat. Their reflection on these tensions helped them think strategically about the demands of designing such a retreat.
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Annotated Bibliography for NWP Professional Writing Retreats
July 2010
John Pennisi
The purpose of this annotated bibliography is to showcase pieces of writing that were developed at the NWP Professional Writing Retreats. From pieces on teacher practice to books about the teaching of writing, this bibliography has something of interest for every teacher. The range of genres highlights the kind of writing that's supported at the Professional Writing Retreats each summer.
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Planning for Study Groups: An Advanced Institute at the NWP in Vermont
June 2010
Patricia McGonegal
NWP in Vermont site leaders are committed to building inservice programs to meet the increasingly diverse professional development needs of teachers and schools in the state. A key part of this effort is providing teacher-leaders with resources, time for learning, and coaching to support them as inservice providers.
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NWP Radio—A Visit With the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers
June 2010
The Alliance for Young Artists & Writers identifies teenagers with exceptional artistic and literary talent and brings their remarkable work to a national audience through The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. Join us as we visit with the Alliance and some of the NWP sites working with the Alliance to identify our most talented young writers.
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Site Leaders Explore Continuity—Enacting the Culture of the NWP Model Year Round
May 2010
Susan Connell Biggs
How do NWP sites develop leadership and build the capacity to meet the needs of their service areas? Site leaders explored this question and others at the 2009 Directors Retreat, where they learned how sites build leadership capacity by engaging teacher-leaders in ongoing opportunities to learn together about NWP site work.
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Palo Alto Students Award Grant to the Bay Area Writing Project
May 2010
Art Peterson
This is the story of how the Bay Area Writing Project submitted itself to arduous examination by students at a local charter school and, as a result, received a cash award to support scholarships for its young writers camps.
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A Professional Writing Retreat for Teachers as Writers: The Minnesota Experiment
April 2010
John Albright
When John Albright of the Minnesota Writing Project organized his site's first Professional Writing Retreat, he and his colleagues faced some unexpected challenges, but gained valuable insights in the process of overcoming them.
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Michigan Network Learns Together About 21st Century Literacies
April 2010
Laura Roop
Responding to the wishes of many participants at two National Writing Projects of Michigan network meetings, the Red Cedar Writing Project designed a four-day, three-strand capacity-building workshop and invited every NWP site in the state to send a team.
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The Web as a Tool for Continuity
October 2010
Evan Nichols, Carol Tateishi, Sonnet Farrell, Tom McKenna, Sondra Porter
This monograph illustrates how the Web can be used effectively to facilitate continuity opportunities at sites. It details the Bay Area Writing Project's ezine, Digital Paper, and the Alaska State Writing Consortium's Virtual Open Institute.
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The Philadelphia Writing Project’s Leadership Inquiry Seminar: Continuity Linked to Site Mission and Local Context
National Writing Project at Work,
October 2009
Teri Hines, Bruce Bowers, Vanessa Brown
This monograph examines the strategies and practices that define the Philadelphia Writing Project's Leadership Inquiry Seminar, a yearlong institute designed to support urban educators in examining practices of leadership and their own growth as leaders.
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Such Stuff as Writing Dreams Are Made Of: Technology in the Writing Retreat
March 2009
Michelle Rogge Gannon
Technology can change the nature of a writing retreat, whether through the way pieces are composed, how they're shared, or how they're responded to. It can also be the subject of the writing itself. Here are some tips that came out of NWP's Writing and Technology: A Professional Writing Retreat.
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Pre-Retreat Coaching Leads to a More Successful Writing Retreat
May 2009
Rebeca García-González
Pre-retreat coaching prepares writing retreat participants to be ready to dive into their drafts at writing retreats—and aids facilitators to work more effectively with writers.
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NWP at Work's New Series Highlights "Continuity" at Local Sites
December 2008
NWP's new Continuity series of monographs focuses on the practices that nurture ongoing professional development and provide an indispensable source for sustained leadership development at local sites.
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Designing a Writing Retreat and Building Site Leadership on a Small Budget
December 2008
Nancy Mellin McCracken, Barbara Smith
Leaders at NWP at Kent State University strove to bring NWP's professional writing retreat experience to their local site on a limited budget. Here are a few things they learned.
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Continuity in the Rhode Island Writing Project: Keeping Teachers at the Center
National Writing Project at Work,
2008
Susan Ozbek, Keith Sanzen, Marjorie Roemer, Susan Vander Does
The Presenters’ Collective Network (PCN) began as a support for teacher-consultants in developing workshops for inservice, but the Rhode Island Writing Project quickly discovered unintended purposes that strengthened the site’s continuity program. Susan Ozbek, Marjorie Roemer, Keith Sanzen, and Susan Vander Does detail how PCN functions along with the tools that help to sustain it.
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Supporting On-Site Teacher-Consultants: New York City Writing Project’s Community of Learners
National Writing Project at Work,
2008
Ed Osterman
Ed Osterman demonstrates how sustained and regular professional development for on-site teacher-consultants not only benefits the teachers in the schools they serve, but also nurtures intellectual and personal growth at the New York City Writing Project. The monograph provides approaches and tools that can be adapted by local sites to support ongoing professional development for teacher-consultants.
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The Challenge of Change: Growth Through Inquiry at the Western Massachusetts Writing Project
National Writing Project at Work,
2008
Susan Connell Biggs, Kevin Hodgson, Bruce Penniman
Authors Susan Connell Biggs, Kevin Hodgson, and Bruce Penniman describe the inquiry approach their site took in responding to both planned and unplanned change at their writing project site. Their account chronicles the creation of a site structure that places the work of the site at the center, providing stability for the site in the midst of changing circumstances. Processes detailed in the monograph will be useful to any local site.
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Maine’s Laptop Initiative Improves Student Writing
February 2008
Anne Miller
The Maine Department of Education is providing a laptop to every middle school student and teacher. And, through programs offered by Maine Writing Project teacher-consultants, teachers learn to use the laptops effectively to improve student writing skills.
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A Reunion and a Patchwork Quilt: Taking the Directors Retreat Home
June 2008
Nick Coles
Site leaders who attended the 2007 Directors Retreat reunite to talk about the programs and changes they've implemented at their sites. The Directors Retreat experience continues to live on in unexpected ways.
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Technology Teams Take Different Paths Toward the Same Goal
July 2007
Technology teams at local sites can serve many purposes, from developing the site's website to bringing technology into its teachers' practices. This article describes how three sites used Technology Matters minigrants to expand their technological capacity.
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After the Summer Institute: Opportunities for Teacher Leadership
The Voice,
2005
Linda Friedrich
The National Writing Project, along with Inverness Research Associates and Ann Lieberman of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, has launched a study on the nature of teacher leadership developed through the writing project. This article, drawing on interview data from the study, highlights TCs' descriptions of how they contribute to their students, their peers, and their writing project sites, and how their connection with their local writing project nurtures them as teachers and leaders...
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Lafayette Reads Ernest Gaines: One Book, One Community
The Voice,
January-February 2003
Elizabeth Nehrbass
Nehrbass describes how in the One Book project, the community of Lafayette, Louisiana, read and discussed Ernest Gaines' A Lesson Before Dying, learning in the process how to talk to each other, listen, and be together.
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Writing Workshop and Contest for Students and Teachers Helps Site Achieve Goals
The Voice,
May-June 2002
Janis Cramer
Cramer describes how the Oklahoma Writing Project's writing workshop and contest attracts talented teachers and students, and helps the site achieve its goals.
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No Classroom, or Project, Is an Island
The Voice,
September-October 2000
Janet A. Swenson
The director of the Red Cedar Writing Project explains some of the challenges the participants at the NWP Directors Retreat discussed, including the many facets of creating successful school-year programs.
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Tulsa Writing Camp
The Voice,
November-December 1999
Eileen Simmons
Simmons describes how the Oklahoma State University Writing project developed a summer writing camp at two elementary schools, in which the schools' teachers serve as faculty after two weeks of professional development work with OSUWP teachers.
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Extending the Invitational: An Online, Intersite Conversation
The Voice,
Summer 1998
Joan Taylor
Site director Taylor writes of how she has found camaraderie and solutions to site problems through the NWP site directors' discussion list.
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NWP Programs Boost Nation's Young Writers
The Voice,
Winter/Spring 1998
Art Peterson
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Myths, Images and Language: One Site's Effort to Inspire and Exhibit Student Work
The Voice,
Fall 1997
Martha Plender
Plender describes how her writing project site organized a museum experience as an inspiration for student writing.
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NWP Sites Reach Out to Parents
The Voice,
Fall 1997
Art Peterson
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Teachers Write to Music at NWP's First Music Marathon
December 2010
NWP teacher-consultants from several states came together—in person and online—to write to the same beats in the first-ever multisite music marathon.
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New York City Writing Project “Retreats” to Write Again!
June 2009
Joe Bellacero
Overcoming the challenges of expense, distance, writer's fear of rejection, and being "just-too-darn-busy," the NYCWP organized its own Professional Writing Retreat and integrated professional writing into its regular work.
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