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Newark Public Schools will receive a $14 million Striving Readers grant over five years to improve the literacy skills of struggling adolescent readers, U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings announced today. Secretary Spellings joined First Lady Laura Bush for the announcement made at an event at Avon Avenue Elementary School in Newark, NJ.

"Reading is the foundation of all learning, a key factor in earning a high school diploma and a ticket to success in the 21st century," said Secretary Spellings. "The Striving Readers grants help more students get the skills they need to succeed in college and the workforce and in life."

Newark Public Schools will focus on students in grades 6-8 at schools with at least 75 percent of students on free and reduced price lunch and identified as in need of improvement under the No Child Left Behind Act. Newark Public Schools will partner with the National Urban Alliance and the New Jersey City University to improve literacy across the curriculum in middle and high schools.

A total of $30 million will be awarded for the 2006-07 school year to support the implementation of eight Striving Readers programs across the country. The programs focus on middle and high schools that have significant numbers of struggling readers and that are striving to meet No Child Left Behind Adequate Yearly Progress requirements in reading. They include a range of research-based adolescent literacy projects serving diverse populations. Each program includes a rigorous evaluation conducted by independent researchers. The president's 2007 budget requests a $70.3 million increase in Striving Readers for a total of more than $100 million.

Grantees may use the Striving Readers funds for activities such as interventions for middle and high school-aged students to improve basic reading skills, motivation, vocabulary, fluency and comprehension using research-based programs; professional development aligned with scientifically based reading research; valid and reliable reading assessments; and the design and implementation of a rigorous evaluation.

Applicants had to meet the following requirements to be eligible to receive Striving Readers grants:

• Serve students in grades 6-12 only in Title I eligible schools; and
• Include each of the three following components in their program: (1) school-level strategies; (2) intensive, targeted intervention for struggling readers; and (3) a project evaluation conducted by an independent evaluator that includes a rigorous experimental research-based evaluation of the intervention.

A fact sheet is available at http://www.ed.gov/nclb/methods/reading/strivingreaders.html. For more information about the Striving Readers program, visit http://www.ed.gov/programs/strivingreaders/index.html.

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