Office of Educational Research and Improvement
Dear Colleague:
The Office of Educational Research and Improvement's
(OERI) Office of Research is inviting applications to
establish a National Reading Research Center to conduct
research and associated activities in reading and related
areas.
Enclosed please find a copy of "Application for A Grant
Under the Educational Research and Development Center
Program" (OMB No. 1850-0602). This document contains (a)
Application Instructions, (b) Center Mission, (c)
Guidance for Preparing An Application, (d) Required
Forms, and (e) Code of Federal Regulations 34 CFR Parts
706 and 708. Other regulations applicable to this
program are contained in the Education Department General
Administrative Regulations, 34 CFR Parts 74, 75, 77, 81,
82, 85, and 86.
Please note that the Secretary gives an absolute
preference to applications that meet the following
priority: English Literacy, including reading, writing,
and language skills (34 CFR 706.3(b)(19)). Estimated
funding levels for this cooperative agreement over a five
year project period are listed in the Federal Register
Notice Inviting Applications. Applications for an
institutional award must be postmarked by October 18,
1991.
The enclosed information has been prepared to assist you
with the preparation of your grant application. If you
need additional assistance, please write to Dr. Anne P.
Sweet at the U.S. Department of Education, Office of
Educational Research and Improvement, 555 New Jersey
Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20208-5648 or contact her
by telephone at (202) 219-2021.
We look forward to receiving and reviewing your
application.
Sincerely,
Milton Goldberg
Director
Office of Research
FEDERAL REGISTER NOTICE
4000-01
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
(CFDA No.: 84.117A)
Educational Research and Development Centers Program
Notice inviting applications for a new award for fiscal
year (FY) 1992.
PURPOSE OF PROGRAM: To support a national research and
development center to conduct research and related
activities in the area of reading.
ELIGIBLE APPLICANTS: The following parties are eligible
to apply for an award for a Research and Development
Center: institutions of higher education, institutions
of higher education in consort with public agencies or
private nonprofit organizations, and interstate agencies
established by compact that operate subsidiary bodies
established to conduct postsecondary educational research
and development.
DEADLINE FOR TRANSMITTAL OF APPLICATIONS: October 18,
1991.
APPLICATIONS AVAILABLE: July 17, 1991
AVAILABLE FUNDS: This Center will be awarded as a
cooperative agreement. Funding for the first year of the
National Reading Research Center will be up to $1.2
million. The following table indicates the estimated
funding levels over the five-year project period. The
funding levels for years 2 through 5 are estimates
depending upon the availability of funds and needs as
reflected in the approved application.
First Year Funding $1.2 Million (up to) Second
Year Funding $1.5 Million
Third Year Funding $1.6 Million
Fourth Year Funding $1.7 Million
Fifth Year Funding $1.8 Million
Five Year Total $7.8 Million.
ESTIMATED NUMBER OF AWARDS: 1.
PROJECT PERIOD: Up to 60 months.
APPLICABLE REGULATIONS: (a) The Education Department
General Administrative Regulations (EDGAR) in 34 CFR
Parts 74, 75, 77, 81, 82, 85, and 86; and (b) The
regulations for this program in 34 CFR Parts 706 and 708.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On April 30, 1991, the
Secretary published a notice in the FEDERAL REGISTER
soliciting written comments on a research agenda for
reading, content, and related areas. The Secretary has
decided to fund a National Reading Research Center to
address many of the issues raised by commenters in
response to the notice.
The mission statement describing the areas of
research the Secretary is particularly interested in
supporting under the National Reading Research Center
will be found in the application package. These areas of
research include: instructional strategies for at-risk
students; evaluation of instructional approaches;
alternative assessments of student learning; teacher
education and instructional interventions; reading and
learning from school textbooks and other content
materials; reading acquisition and cognition; and the
sociocultural contexts within which reading takes place.
PRIORITY: Under 34 CFR 75.105(c)(3) and 34 CFR 706.3(b),
the Secretary gives an absolute preference to
applications that meet the following priority. The
Secretary funds under this competition only an
application that meets this absolute priority.
Research on Reading and Literacy. (English
Literacy, including reading, writing, and language skills
(34 CFR 706.3(b)(19)).
SELECTION CRITERIA: In evaluating applications for
grants under this program competition, the Secretary uses
the selection criteria in 34 CFR 708.11.
The program regulations in 34 CFR 706.20(b) and (d)
provide that the Secretary may award up to 100 points for
the selection criteria, including a reserved 10 points.
For this competition, the 10 points are added to plan of
operation (34 CFR 708.11(c)), for a possible total of 25
points.
FOR APPLICATIONS OR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr.
Anne P. Sweet, U.S. Department of Education, OERI, Office
of Research, Room 606D, 555 New Jersey Avenue, N.W.,
Washington, D.C. 20208-5648. Telephone: (202) 219-2021.
Deaf and hearing impaired individuals may call the
Federal Dual Party Relay Service at 1-800-877-8339 (in
the Washington, D.C. 202 area code, telephone 708-9300)
between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m., Eastern time. PROGRAM
AUTHORITY 20 U.S.C. 1221e.
Dated: July 8, 1991
Bruno V. Manno
Acting Assistant Secretary for
Educational Research and
Improvement
National Reading Research Center
Mission Statement
Initial Year Funding: $1.2 Million
Duration of Award: 5 Years
Type of Award: Cooperative Agreement
I. Introduction
Reading is a foundation for learning across the school
curriculum. The ability to read enables people to
function independently in the everyday world and to
engage in lifelong learning. How do our students measure
up in terms of their reading proficiency for acquiring
content knowledge in school and for independent living
and learning after they graduate from high school? Trend
data (1971-88) showing the results of NAEP reading
assessments of 9-, 13-, and 17-year-old students show
that overall, for students across the three ages, reading
performance was as good as, if not slightly better than
it was two decades earlier. Nonetheless, the levels of
reading proficiency show that the greatest gains have
occurred in lower-level skills, while the greatest
decline has occurred in higher level applications. In
other words, although most students appear to have
developed the ability to read at a literal level of
understanding as they progress through school, it seems
that they have not overcome difficulties in analyzing and
synthesizing what they read. By age 17, fewer than half
of the students tested in the 1988 NAEP assessment were
able to consistently understand, summarize, and explain
relatively complex information.
President Bush and the Nation's governors met at a
historic education summit in Charlottesville where it was
declared that "the time has come, for the first time in
United States history, to establish clear national
performance goals, goals that will make us
internationally competitive." Six national goals emerged
as a first step in carrying out this imperative.
Becoming a competent reader underlies these goals.
On April 18, 1991, President Bush unveiled his Education
Strategy. AMERICA 2000 is a long-range plan to move
every community in America toward achieving the national
education goals adopted by the President and the
Governors last year. Students' ability to read and
American schools' ability to teach our children to read
permeate AMERICA 2000's four related themes: (1) Creating
better and more accountable schools for today's students;
(2) Creating a New Generation of American Schools for
tomorrow's students; (3) Transforming America into a
Nation of students; and (4) Making our communities places
where learning will happen.
The current generation must become literate enough to
meet the demands of the future, as we enter the twenty-
first century. The admonition set forth by the National
Academy of Education's Commission on Reading in its
landmark report, Becoming a Nation of Readers (1985),
rings true as urgently today as it did when these words
were first written.
"The world is moving into a technological-
information age in which full participation in
education, science, business, industry, and the
professions requires increasing levels of
literacy. What was a satisfactory level of literacy
in 1950 probably will be marginal by the year 2000."
It is clear that the pace toward reaching substantially
higher levels of reading proficiency must be accelerated
dramatically if we are to achieve the national education
goals within the time-lines specified.
All of those involved with improving education count on
education research to guide them in their judgements.
Education research contributes to the improvement of
teaching and learning in schools, and research on reading
has provided the basis for some of the most significant
contributions. These contributions interface with the
cognitive revolution that has unfolded during the
previous two decades. An explosion of knowledge has
accrued about how people learn, remember, and reason. We
have learned much about the knowledge and abilities that
distinguish experts from novices. We have learned much
about how people learn in school as compared to the real
world. We have learned much about self-regulation and
how it is a key aspect of skilled reading. There remains
much more to be learned about these and related
understandings, and the unique role each one plays in
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The National Reading Research Center will engage in
research aimed at improving reading proficiency for all
students, and thereby improving the Nation's level of
literacy. The Center will strive to develop a broad,
comprehensive model of reading acquisition that
integrates the various cognitive, social, motivational,
cultural, and instructional elements that play a role in
the reading process and learning to read.
Within this framework, the Center's primary objective
will be to understand more fully how students learn to
read, the strategies they use as they become better
readers, their use of acquired reading skills in learning
content knowledge, and the myriad of factors that
influence the acquisition and development of reading
proficiency, including the context in which reading takes
place. A second objective will be to understand more
fully the nature of the reading process particularly as
it pertains to students at-risk for reading failure, the
relevance of reading to learning content subjects, and
the relationship between reading and writing, and other
literacy skills. A third objective will be to understand
more fully the phenomenon of current instructional trends
and interventions, including issues related to the
education of teachers
¸he implementation of new teaching
models and instructional strategies, and the evaluation
of instruction and student progress.
The National Reading Research Center will engage in (1)
systematic, longer term research aimed at broadening our
understanding of the many aspects of reading and
expanding the theories upon which future research may be
based; and (2) shorter term research aimed at improving
the teaching and learning of reading in American schools.
The student populations to be studied include students
from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds at all
grade levels, pre-kindergarten through high school.
III. Illustrative Center Activities
Through a thorough and extended planning process, OERI
identified the specific research activities listed below
as particularly important and appropriate to the National
Reading Research Center's mission. In order to meet the
Nation's most pressing educational needs, OERI is
encouraging applicants to be responsive to these
activities, especially those marked with an asterisk (*).
This list, however, is neither exhaustive nor exclusive.
Applicants may choose not to incorporate all the topics
in their proposals, just as they may propose alternative
topics consistent with the Center's mission. Applicants
should be sure to include a detailed rationale for how
the studies incorporated in their proposals form a
coherent research agenda for this Center. Applicants
should also list and describe in detail each study
proposed.
Learning
The ability to read is key to enabling students to
achieve success in and outside of the school setting. An
important prerequisite for improving the literacy level
of all learners is to understand the ways in which
students acquire and develop proficiency in reading.
Areas of inquiry critical to improving students' ability
to read and related literacy skills include:
* o the ways in which knowledge is acquired in
school subjects through reading content texts
* o early literacy learning and the influence
brought to bear by home, school and community
environments
o the role of composing and writing in the
acquisition of reading proficiency
o reading processes and the dynamics that unfold
during the acquisition of reading proficiency
o the ways in which alternate forms of reading,
writing, and communicating through
technological means bear upon the development
of reading proficiency
o the ways in which motivational and
environmental factors affect the acquisition
and development of students' reading
proficiency
o the ways in which neuroscience can contribute
to our understanding of the reading process and
how students learn to read and read to learn
Instruction
Effective reading instruction involves teaching students
higher-order cognitive learning and reasoning, whereby
students develop the ability to acquire new knowledge in
other school subjects. An important prerequisite for
raising the reading proficiency level of all students is
to understand how best to engage them in learning to read
and reading to learn. Areas of inquiry critical to
promoting the effective teaching of reading include:
* o the ways in which new instructional approaches
(i.e., whole language, phonemic awareness
training) affect beginning readers,
particularly at-risk learners
* o instructional strategies that facilitate
learning from text and textbooks in content
area school subjects
* o models that connect effective teaching
practices and the education of teachers, both
preservice and inservice
o the ways in which new models of teaching and
instructional organization (e.g., cognitive
apprenticeship, cooperative learning,
conversational discussion) impact students'
reading proficiency
o instructional interventions and strategies
aimed at the prevention of reading failure that
take into account the needs of culturally and
linguistically diverse students
o instructional strategies that use technological
advances to teach reading to students at all
grade levels
o instructional strategies that take into account
the contexts in which reading takes place and
related factors that influence the development
of reading proficiency
Assessment
The assessment of students' ability to read will continue
to play a dominant role in society's need to gauge the
effectiveness of reading instruction in American schools,
students' aptitude for academic learning up through post-
secondary education, and students' readiness to enter the
work force. Given the variety of decisions that are made
about students, schools, and schooling, based upon
reading test scores, it is critical that assessments of
reading proficiency reflect our current understanding
about what reading is. Areas of inquiry critical to
promoting the development of authentic reading
proficiency measures include:
* o the effectiveness of current and new measures
of reading proficiency
* o measures of reading proficiency that align
instruction with assessment in ecologically
valid ways and take into account multiple
purposes and audiences
o outcome measures for new forms of reading
instruction (e.g., Reading Recovery; whole
language)
o measures of reading proficiency that
distinguish reading competence from background
and content knowledge and that take into
account factors such as motivation and interest
o authentic assessments that measure students'
growth in reading proficiency within prescribed
instructional programs
o alternative assessments of reading proficiency
that take into account culturally and
linguistically diverse students
o assessments of teaching strategies that take
into account the dynamics of classroom
"cultures"
IV. Anticipated Benefits
The National Reading Research Center will disseminate the
results of its research to a wide audience--education
practitioners, parents, researchers, policymakers,
textbook publishers, and other members of the business
community--with an end toward heightening students'
literacy level. The anticipated benefits of the Center's
work are two-fold:
o Broadening the foundation for future research.
Expanding current theories on reading and
building new ones will add significantly to our
knowledge-base about reading and literacy
learning. The insights that we gain from
sustained research efforts will ultimately
lead to improvements and refinements in the way
we teach reading in our Nation's schools. The
net result will undoubtedly be made apparent by
marked rises in students' level of reading
proficiency.
o Improving classroom practice. We have accrued
a rich knowledge-base that is ripe with
practicable research findings, and there are
some specific strategies that teachers can use
to enable their students to acquire reading
proficiency more readily. Although the
Center's longer term aim is to affect broad
improvements in classroom practice, the
Center's shorter term objective should be
directed at initiating immediate changes and
easing transitions in the ways that reading is
taught in American classrooms.
V. Special Instructions
The National Reading Research Center (NRRC) is expected
to embrace the belief that theory must be grounded in
practice. Moreover, researchers and practitioners may
assume alternating roles--that is, researchers and
practitioners are equally teacher and learner, leader and
follower. Collaborations among teacher-researcher
colleagues will increase the likelihood that the fruits
of the Center's research will be assimilated readily into
everyday practice in classrooms.
The Center is also expected to exhibit a commitment to
nurturing a program of research that is multidimensional
and interdisciplinary. The Center will integrate
divergent views and study the development of reading
proficiency from multiple perspectives--cognitive,
linguistic, sociocultural, and contextual.
Moreover, the Center is expected to coordinate its
research efforts with the Writing and Literacy Center and
other OERI R&D Centers whose programs of research include
studies on aspects of reading and literacy. In addition,
the National Reading Research Center is expected to work
cooperatively with OERI's Regional Laboratories, the ERIC
Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills, and
the National Diffusion Network to disseminate research
findings and other products.
Finally, the Center is encouraged to maintain an
appropriate professional affiliation with such
organizations as the International Reading Association,
the National Reading Conference, the National Council of
Teachers of English, the Association for Supervision and
Curriculum Development, the National Association of
Elementary School Principals, and the American
Educational Research Association.
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