Last spring, Milwaukee School Board director James Ferguson was perplexed as to why Milwaukee Public Schools‘ efforts to implement the science of reading (SOR) in the district were so difficult. “It seemed that we could not get a grip on the science of reading training. I was not satisfied that we didn’t have anybody trained. I really wanted to understand what the training consisted of and why it was so difficult to turn the page.”
Ferguson turned to the one person he knew in MPS who had a good understanding of SOR, the district’s own board clerk, Tina Owen-Moore, who has been recognized as a leader in implementing the science of reading in Wisconsin as the superintendent in Cudahy. As it turns out, Owen-Moore was Ferguson’s eighth grade English teacher.
“We talk all the time,” said Ferguson.
Owen-Moore knew people in Whitewater who were successfully implementing SOR. Meanwhile, school board director Henry Leonard also was talking to Owen-Moore, and when he heard of the possibility of visiting the Whitewater district in March, with only weeks before he would leave the board, he jumped at it.
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“Ferguson and I went with Dr. Owen-Moore. It was eye-opening,” Leonard says. “They let us ask any questions. Their WEAC representative was there. Administrators. I know some of the questions I asked: ‘Did you have any difficulty in getting your staff to take the extra training?’ To a person, perhaps 12 people in the room representing different groups, they all said, ‘We have to have success.’ Large immigrant population in Whitewater. ‘We had people who were interested in making people learn how to read, but we were not getting any traction. We were not going anywhere. So, we decided the best route to go was to get some of these more formative processes in the science of reading.’” Over 80% of the staff agreed to it.