Each of the 175 National Writing Project university sites collaborates with local schools to create a range of professional development opportunities in the teaching of writing and to build programs that serve the diverse needs of teachers, students, administrators, and parents in the community. Below are a few examples that illustrate how sites work locally. Visit the map of sites at the National Writing Project website to find a site in your community. http://www.writingproject.org/About/map.html.

The New York City Writing Project (NYCWP) conducts inservice programs in elementary, middle, and secondary public schools in all five boroughs of the city. The site maintains a successful inservice model consisting of three mutually reinforcing components: (1) seminars in the teaching of reading and writing, conducted at the school, for teachers from all disciplines and grade levels; (2) teacher-consultants assigned to the school; and (3) programs for school administrators, focused on their educational goals. In this intensive approach to professional development, a writing project teacher-consultant is present in a school one or two consecutive days per week and working alongside teachers in their classrooms, as well as co-coordinating graduate seminars, attending committee meetings, and conducting faculty workshops. NYCWP's inservice seminars give teachers strategies they can put to immediate use. They also engage teachers in discussions about challenges of teaching and about research in the teaching of reading and writing.

The Mississippi Writing/Thinking Institute regularly conducts multi-year partnerships with schools and districts across the state, sending experienced teacher-consultants into the schools to work with local teachers and administrators. In one such partnership with Kemper County School District, six full-day staff development sessions focused on new research and best practices in writing and reading across the curriculum. In addition, teacher participants engaged in a professional reading workshop and correlated best practices with the state curriculum. As follow-up, teachers joined study groups where they reflected on how the strategies worked in their own classrooms and where they analyzed student work as a means of strengthening their instruction. Teachers also benefited from demonstrations in their own classrooms.

The Bay Area Writing Project's (BAWP) Saturday Seminar series is an example of a program that gives local schools ready access to the knowledge and classroom expertise of BAWP teacher-consultants. Open to teachers, administrators, parents, teacher educators, and community members, the program takes place on eight Saturdays from October through May on the UC Berkeley campus. The content is tailored to current and emerging issues and concerns of Bay Area teachers. Recent topics include writing across the curriculum, reading and writing connections, teaching academic writing, teachers as writers, and writing to learn.

The Southern Arizona Writing Project (SAWP) is both a rural site and an urban site, serving the entire southern third of the state, which includes five counties, 71 school districts, and three Native American reservations. Working with local teachers to serve the needs of this diverse population, SAWP creates programs such as advanced institutes on teaching writing to linguistically diverse learners and literacy programs for Native American students. In addition, SAWP sponsors satellite sites to serve teachers and students in remote communities, and partners with Arizona State Museum to develop student writing activities in conjunction with the permanent exhibits.