The Western Massachusetts Writing Project has been working on crafting a mission statement for the organization that will represent not only who we are as an organization, but also who we will become as we move into the future. This work has been helped along by the leaders of Project Outreach by providing a lens to look at our site and our work along the lines of social justice, race, gender and equity issues.
This week, the WMWP Executive Board adopted the new mission statement for our organization and the board believes that the statement not only documents the role that we play in the Pioneer Valley and beyond, but also maps out a vision for the future of the organization.
Here is the new WMWP Mission Statement:
“The mission of the Western Massachusetts Writing Project, a local site of the National Writing Project, is to create a professional community where teachers and other educators feel welcomed to come together to deepen individual and collective experiences as writers and our understanding of teaching and learning in order to challenge and transform our practice. Our aim is to improve learning in our schools — urban, rural and suburban.
Professional development provided by the Western Massachusetts Writing Project values reflection and inquiry and is built on teacher knowledge, expertise and leadership.
Central to our mission is the development of programs and opportunities that are accessible and relevant to teachers, students and their families from diverse backgrounds, paying attention to issues of race, gender, language, class and culture and how these are linked to teaching and learning.”
Using a site called Wordle, which transforms text into word clouds, Technology Liaison Kevin Hodgson created this image of our mission statement. Notice how learning and writing are so prominent in the mix.
What do you think of the mission statement? Does it reflect your values and your vision of the Western Massachusetts Writing Project? We invite you to leave comments and thoughts here at this blog post. To do so, just click on the link for comments just above this post.
Are you interested in writing for publication? Here is an opportunity just for you.
Professional Writing Retreat
August 5-7, 2008, Stump Sprouts Guest Lodge, West Hawley, MA.
This three day writing retreat will give participants the opportunity to work on writing projects for publication, in such venues as professional journals, newsletters, newspapers, and on-line venues. Come to write, share work in progress, and receive feedback. The coaches are to former WMWP site directors, Charlie Moran and Bruce Penniman. Enrollment is limited to 16 people. Registration fee of $160 includes meals and lodging. A copy of the brochure is attached with more information and application instructions. Note that applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis so early application is advisable. Final decisions about participation will be made in early June.
(Read about last year’s retreat)
The new Western Massachusetts Writing Project Technology Team held its first major event — Technology Across the Curriculum — that drew about 25 teachers to the Norris Elementary School in Southampton on a Saturday morning in May.
The event featured workshops on social networking, podcasting and digital storytelling, and the featured speaker was Mike Flynn, the Massachusetts Teacher of the year. Mike talked about video production in the lower elementary classroom.
If you missed the event, or just want to re-live it, there are three podcasts that you can listen to or download into your computer or MP3 player:
Finally, here are two comics created by participants in the Digital Storytelling workshop:
If you could not attend the conference, you can still access our Technology Across the Curriculum Weblog, where all the workshop links and activities are located.
– The WMWP Tech Team
Members of the Executive Board and the Project Outreach Leadership Team met on March 29 in Bartlett Hall to look at our site through a lens of inquiry. The aim of the meeting was to practice ‘looking and looking again’. Along with our mission statement draft and NWP Project Outreach goals we set to the task of examining our SI documents as they relate to the Project Out reach goals of access, relevance and diversity. The discussions were intense and productive. Hard questions were asked of ourselves and our site. As the morning moved into the afternoon, we knew that the work was just beginning. More questions unfolded than answers.
The answers to the initial question of “What do we know for sure?” became less clear as we delved deeply into our core values as a site. We know we have more work to do. The issues of access, relevance and diversity bubbled to the surface with questions and comments related to our program schedules, how we promote our programs, and the language we use to describe our programs. We looked at the SI from every angle. Finally, we realized that we need to bring “new eyes to the table” that we can not answer all the questions without finding ways to hear new voices.
As a teacher, executive board member, soon to be ex-co director and a current SI co director I am excited about our journey. I am looking forward to our next steps and eager to hear from our broader community of teacher leaders.
By: Mary Farrin
Another of our WMWP teachers was featured in the Springfield Republican this past week. Diana Roy, who now coordinates the partnership between the newspaper and our writing project site, showcased some of her students as poets.
Diana begins her piece by asking:
“In this age of high stakes testing, some wonder if a place exists in middle school English education for creative writing. After all, students are held accountable for reading in all genres and for writing in response to literature or to an essay prompt, but is there time for a skill that is not tested?“
Republican photo by DAVE ROBACK From left, Diana Roy, a teacher at the Paul R. Baird Middle School in Ludlow, works with students Nicole E. Moore and Sophia J. Fernandes.
Head here to read the entire story.
The Massachusetts Writing Project will hold its second annual conference on May 3 and you are invited to attend. It’s a strong program with sessions ranging from family literacy to high school/college transitions, presented by ones of us from WMWP as well as TCs from our other Massachusetts’ sites. Award-winning poet X. J. Kennedy, author of dozens of books for adults and children, will give the keynote address.
You can get all the registration information and download the conference brochure at the Massachusetts Writing Project website.
We invite you to consider joining the WMWP Technology Team for a morning of workshops centered around the use of technology and writing across the various content areas, including math, science and social studies.
You can download the Technology Across the Curriculum flier with this link and the flier includes a registration form.
Or you can use the WMWP Website to register electronically (but you will still need to send in your fee to reserve your space at the workshop).
We encourage you to come with a colleague and to offer some inducement, we will lower the registration fee by five bucks if you do bring a friend from your building to the event.
See you there!
The WMWP Technology Team
Save the date:
March 19, 2008 from 9am-3pm
Bartlett Hall, Room 256, UMass Amherst
Diana Callahan and Mary-Ann DeVita Palmieri with be hosting a ‘Writing into Retirement’ retreat. All retired educators and those who have not retired yet are invited to attend this retreat. Bring a friend and a poem, story or memories your recall about teaching.
A light lunch will be served. Please RSVP by Friday, March 14th.
Email: wmwp@english.umass.edu
Phone: 413-545-5466
The latest feature on one of our WMWP teachers — Astrid Lindstrom — is in the Springfield Republican newspaper. Her students worked on a unit around autobiographical writing.
Republican photo by DAVE ROBACK Students of teacher Astrid J. Lindstrom at E.N. White School in Holyoke are, seated from left, Natasha M. Pirela, Austin J. Theriault, Sarah D. Theroux, Alexs S. Vazquez, Omara L. Hall, and, standing from left, Natalie M. Rivera, Zane E. Patrie, Lindstrom, Timmothy J. Ortiz, and Lissette Rojas.
Head to the Springfield Republican’s NIE website for the complete feature
Sharon Washington, the new executive director of the National Writing Project, paid a visit to the offices of the Western Massachusetts Writing Project this past week. Washington has taken over leadership of the NWP from Richard Sterling. She has strong connections to the Western Massachusetts region, as she was the founding director of Project SPIRIT at Springfield College (before moving on to leadership slots at University of California, Spelman College and Bennett College for Women). Washington still has family ties here in the area.
Washington sat down with WMWP Executive Director Anne Herrington, in-Service Coordinator Susan Biggs, Technology Liaison Kevin Hodgson, and English Language Learners Network leaders Wilma Ortiz and Karen Sumaryono, who also represented Project Outreach in the chat. The discussion ranged from an overview of the wealth of offerings at our site to integration of technology into WMWP programs to the creation of leadership opportunities through the ELL network.
(Wilma talks about the development of the ELL Network to Sharon Washington, new executive director of NWP)
Washington was curious to know how the NWP can continue to support the work of the sites and Herrington pointed out that much of the work being done at WMWP is supported through NWP mini-grants and the flow of those grants would continue to be valuable to develop and support projects at the site level and in the classrooms.
