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INFORMAL REPORT TO CITY COUNCIL MEMBERS No. 10305
August 20, 2019
To the Mayor and Members of the City Council
Page 1 of 2
SUBJECT: UPDATE ON THE 100X25 READING INSTRUCTION PROGRAM
This Informal Report is to provide an update on the 100x25 Reading Instruction Program
endorsed by City Council via Resolution 5051-02-2019 on March 12, 2019.
Programs were offered at 26 sites which included 20 Community Centers, four Mobile Recreation
sites, one Fort Worth Independent School (FWISD Elementary school and one apartment
complex. Fire, Neighborhood Services and Park & Recreation Department staff provided the
direct instruction along with our Museum partners. Overall enrollment was 2462 with a high of
167 and a low of 30: average attendance was 93.8%
The parameters of the program were: six weeks beginning June 17 - July 26, 2019; 45 minutes
daily intentional reading instruction best practices via classroom method and/or literacy spurts;
and four days weekly. Over 180 City of Fort Worth (CFW) and museum employees received 16
hours of direct training on how to integrate the reading instruction best practices into existing
programs during Camp Fort Worth. The best practices were phonemic awareness, phonics,
fluency, comprehension, writing and vocabulary and oral language development. Museum partner
staff provided direct instruction at Victory Forest, Como and North-Tri Ethnic Community Centers.
Museum partners included the Amon Carter Museum of American Art (ACM), Botanical Research
Institute of Texas (BRIT), National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame, Kimbell Art Museum and
the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. The ACM also hosted a full six week/four-days weekly
program at Van Zandt Guinn, a CFW sponsored site.
Through Read Fort Worth (RFW), four Literacy Support Specialists (LSS) were assigned to
These persons were paid directly by RFW ($25 per hour, 20 hours
weekly for a six-week period). The LSSs were retired and or current FWISD educators with
specific experience in reading instruction. These persons were assigned as liaisons to the
Community Centers to provide content knowledge (direct instruction as needed) classroom
management and meet other needs as determined by the site supervisor. United Community
Centers also provided direct reading instruction at Northside and Southside Community Centers.
Substantive reading instruction was provided also by select summer employees who were
experienced elementary school teachers, some with specific experience in reading instruction.
Lastly, RFW provided a fifth LSS who worked alongside Fire Department staff during the last two
weeks of the program at the Valley at Cobb Park, an apartment complex. Click link below for
story about the program.... http://readfortworth.org/summer-scholars-collaborative-putting-
out-a-different-kind-of-fire/
Important to the success of the program was the availability of books not only for instructional
purposes but for onsite availability for children and free books to take home. The Friends of the
Fort Worth Library opened their Bookstore so that Center staff could select books for their onsite
ke
books to give to children to take home and over 1500 Fort Worth Library discards to have
available on site. Also, at the end of the program RFW also provided 2445
ISSUED BY THE CITY MANAGER FORT WORTH, TEXAS
INFORMAL REPORT TO CITY COUNCIL MEMBERS No. 10305
August 20, 2019
To the Mayor and Members of the City Council
Page 2 of 2
SUBJECT: UPDATE ON THE 100X25 READING INSTRUCTION PROGRAM
distributed among the Centers: these were books to give to children to take home. Also, Cowboy
Santa donated $1000 which purchased 274 books to be used for instruction. Books were
selected from the recommended list provided by the two Texas Wesleyan professors who
conducted the training. Further, Cowboy Santa donated books to the Police Department to
distribute, at their discretion, as they do the teddy bears.
In many ways, the Program met expectations. However, whether we reached the ultimate goal of
students maintaining or increasing reading levels, will not be known until the program analyses
are conducted by FWISD using student data from spring 2019 and fall 2019. In order to submit
data to FWISD on our program participants, we required parental consent. Of the 2462 students
enrolled in Camp, only 400 parental consent forms were returned:
information with FWISD. One factor contributing to a smaller number of forms being returned
was the reality that not all students enrolled in Camp went to FWISD schools. For example, of
the 106 students participating in Camp at Chisholm Trail Community Center, only 5 were FWISD
students. Another contributing factor was that the parental consent forms were not available
during enrollment, which would have made it easier to get signatures. Plans are now in place to
have the parental consent form included in the electronic enrollment packet for summer 2020.
Once the results are analyzed, council will be briefed. We anticipate results in December 2019.
For additional information or responses to your questions, please contact Gleniece A. Robinson,
Director, Educational Strategies at Gleniece.Robinson@fortworthtexas.gov or 817-392-6575 or
817-944-6900.
David Cooke
City Manager
ISSUED BY THE CITY MANAGER FORT WORTH, TEXAS