Members Present:

1.      Bright, Bob

2.      Cole, Cindy

3.      Darnall, Byron

4.      Foster, Gaye

5.      Holder, Dwight

6.      Honaker, Bonnie

7.      Houchens, Laura

8.      Jensen, Liz

9.      Martin, Linda

10.  McCalla, Katie

11.  Mills, Shanan

12.  Nance, Ann

13.  Padilla, Anne

14.  Scott, Karen

15.  Skaggs, Angie

John welcomed the team.  Many new members were present.

Cindy Cole nominated Katie McChair as Chair of our Leadership Team meetings.  Shanan Mills made a motion to accept; Anne Padilla seconded the motion. 

John Hagaman shared the State WP Network booklet, “Leadership in Literacy.”  A KWP State Network Fall Conference on School wide Literacy will be held in Hazard, Ky. Oct. 15. 

The State Writing Committee met four times at Barnes and Noble and participants wrote in various genres.

Four Gender Gap Workshops were held at the State Parks with great success.  These workshops led to the State Fall Conference on achievement gaps. 

Feedback on the LETS Work Institute emphasized the potential for impacting instruction; therefore, driving student achievement was shared. Ann Nance looks forward to participating in the implementation of inquiry groups in the WKU Project site.

Anne Padilla reported on the Reading Initiative at Bardstown.  The objective was to build thinking/strategies for teaching reading.  Many nonproject members participated.  A daunting task due to time constraints, yet a successful workshop in guiding teachers to resources, strategies, networking, and reinforcement of the interdependence of reading and writing. 

Young Writers’ Camp had 22 participants (Bonnie Honaker and Linda Martin directed the camp.) from SCATS.  These young writers chose this class from a variety of offerings and enthusiastically wrote and revised to perfect skills.  The camp’s culminating project was an anthology of 150 pages. 

Bob Bright and Angie Skaggs led the Invitational Institute and reported leaving with a wealth of ideas for next year. 

Inservice Workshops (2003-2004) faced a challenging year, according to Karen Scott.  Professional development is most often job-imbedded and held at the schools.   A very successful administrators workshop was held in July, however.

John Hagaman reported that authors being considered to lead a workshop for our 20^th year celebration are Rief, Tovanni, Allen, Fletcher, and Culham.

Leadership Team members moved into breakout sessions for discussion groups.

.     The newsletter was reviewed along with the current brochure.  Everyone was pleased Mary Fye’s editorship.  Everyone is asked to send information and updates to Mary for inclusion in an Alumni News section.  David Lenoir displayed the new WKU Web page to much praise.

·         Ideas for 20^th Year Celebration:  Friday Night = Fun & Celebration!  Theme song?  Theme based on change…  Authors discussed and group was interested in Chris Tovanni and Linda Rief.  (Shanan Mills and Gaye Foster)  Discussion of April date.  Suggested to continue with plans for this year and consider a Fall Celebration.

·         Mini Grants-  Will keep focus groups and groups will emphasize mentoring in writing/reading for new teachers, book studies, and analysis of student writing (Bob Bright and Cindy Cole)

·         Inservice Outreach- Proposed fewer, but bigger draws.  (Karen Scott, Laura Houchens,  Ann Nance)  PD is now most often job-imbedded and in-school, so fewer PD sessions on targeted topics.  New director/coordinator- possibly a retired teacher. Karen Scott and Karen Alford are stepping down.  Interest in workshops has come from Cumberland, Monroe, and Clinton counties.  On November 5, the current Project 20 will share mini-demonstrations first presented in June during the Institute.  Workshop is open to all.

·         Continuation- Possibly focus on needs of individual teachers and not numbers to measure success- utilize Project Members in each school to mentor teachers in writing. (Dwight Holder and Byron Darnell)  As a catalyst to bring Project teachers together who teach at the same school, have them host a Saturday session on successes and problems, open to all Project teachers.

·         Documentation- Anne Padilla and Liz Jensen called for CATS Scores documentation to show improvement in reading and writing scores (past 5 years, 2001-2005) in schools impacted by Writing Project teachers.  (Important to include statistics such as free and reduced, ESL, migrant, gender, number of WP teachers in schools, etc.) 

Next Leadership Team meeting will be January 21, 2006- Motion by Shanan Mills and seconded by Ann Nance.    Meeting adjourned.

Recorder:  Ann Nance