Bush's reading plan: retrain teachers

The governor wants to spend millions retraining teachers in new methods of reading instruction.

By ALISA ULFERTS, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published February 27, 2002

TALLAHASSEE -- Last week, Gov. Jeb Bush announced an ambitious goal to get every student reading at grade level within 10 years. On Tuesday, he announced how he would do it: retrain thousands of teachers across the state.

Bush proposes spending $48-million in federal dollars plus about $50-million in state funds to retrain all 57,670 elementary and 20,142 middle school teachers in new methods of reading instruction that Bush said are scientifically proven to work.

Elementary teachers would be trained within the next three years, and middle school teachers, within five, Bush said.

A new reading research institute at Florida State University will help train teachers, as will major textbook publishers that have contracted with the state to provide up to 100 hours of instruction per teacher.

Maureen Dinnen, president of the Florida Education Association, said Bush's program sounds good, as long as he provides teachers with enough time and money. "We just hope this isn't an empty promise," Dinnen said.

Bush previewed his reading initiative during an appearance last week at St. Petersburg College, but he saved the specifics until Tuesday.

Even his description before the Florida Board of Education left out some details, such as precise funding. But he stressed the main goal: to get all kids reading at grade level by 2012.

That may not sound ambitious, but it is. Forty-seven percent of elementary students now read below grade level. That increases to 57 percent in middle school and 62 percent in high school.

"Reading is the core of the learning experience. If you can't read, you can't do math. . . . If you can't read, you can't write," Bush said.

Bush's plan -- called Just Read, Florida! -- will emphasize a newer style of teaching that ends the assumption that kids pick up learning skills as naturally as they picked up speaking skills, said Joseph Torgesen, the FSU professor who will head the new reading research center.

Instead, teachers will adopt a more "relentless" style of teaching that focuses more on helping kids recognize sounds in words and on building vocabulary, Torgesen said.

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