Dayton Public Schools Implements Fast ForWord To Improve Reading Skills

Ohio's Dayton Public Schools (DPS) will implement a family of intervention programs to help students who need to improve their reading skills.

The move is part of the district's 2011-2015 academic plan, "15,000 Reasons to Succeed."

"Two of our district goals are to have every student reading on grade level by third grade and to ensure that all of our students are college and career ready by the time they graduate," said Lisa Minor, executive director for school improvement at DPS. "We believe that providing this type of intervention program, along with others, will help us raise student achievement and reach these goals."

The programs, Scientific Learning's Fast ForWord products, will initially be used by students in grades 2, 3, 7, and 8 in 21 of the districts preK-8 schools.

Fast ForWord is "designed to accelerate learning by developing the student brain to process more efficiently" according to information released by the company. The programs feature individualized exercises in memory, attention, processing, and sequencing, and will be implemented at DPS through the company's SciLearn On Demand platform, a software-as-a-service solution that allows students, teachers, and administrators to access the products through any computer with an Internet connection.

The implementation will begin this year and is being funded through a Race to the Top grant.

Dayton Public Schools serves approximately 15,000 students with 30 schools and an annual budget of more than $169 million. More information about the district is available at dps.k12.oh.us.

Visit scilearn.com for more information about Fast ForWord.

About the Author

Joshua Bolkan is contributing editor for Campus Technology, THE Journal and STEAM Universe. He can be reached at [email protected].

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