“What we are doing is creating a model that centers around building capacity of teachers, while allowing the teachers to still be the owner and innovator of what needs to occur in that classroom,” stated Dr. David Vroonland, Mesquite ISD Superintendent.
In education, one doesn’t often hear about literacy and innovation in the same sentence. When Mesquite ISD (MISD) partnered with engage2learn in 2015, however, that was the goal. Dr. Vroonland wanted to both improve literacy and move the district from a culture of compliance to a culture of ownership and innovation, and intentionally creating culture is exactly what e2L does!
Knowing that an adaptive solution begins with a locally-designed solution, e2L facilitated the district stakeholders in designing the Mesquite ISD Literacy Framework within which teachers and campus leaders could innovate. Then, every elementary campus team designed a unique plan for innovation and literacy best practices within the framework.
The district supported their teachers and leaders in making this shift by investing in e2L eGrowe Coaching for leaders, teachers, and coaches in three cohorts over three years. The investment in coaching and innovation has proven that you can increase literacy and achievement through a vehicle of innovation. Even in the first year, both the qualitative and the quantitative the results were clear.
Mesquite ISD is seeing a growth in literacy in their second-graders who are going on to third grade. e2L coached classrooms had 87.19% of the learners reading on grade level, compared to just 78.13% in non-coached classrooms. In addition, at-risk learners who entered the grade level on Tier 3 or Tier 2 are moving to Tier 1 because of the strong foundation of Tier 1 differentiated instruction in the Literacy Framework. For example, in 2017, 268 Kindergarten students who entered at-risk, left for 1st grade on track! Innovating the learning environment is changing the trajectory of learners’ lives in Mesquite ISD.
