The Adolescent Literacy Podcast

We're off this week, but Melanie pops in to say hello and give a quick book recommendation. Hope everyone is getting a moment to rest and recharge! See you next week.

"Schools were not built to optimize learning." This week, Michael Horn, creator of podcast and Substack The Future of Education , joins us to unpack what it would take to rethink education for the students actually sitting in classrooms today. From mastery-based learning to the false binary around small group instruction, Michael and Louise dig into what it would really take to rebuild a...

What does a student's day actually feel like when everything around them is disconnected? Different teachers, different routines, different language, different expectations — class after class after class. For older striving readers already carrying years of compounding gaps, that disconnection isn't just frustrating… it's a barrier. This week, we're joined by Kate Crist, founder o...

What if the time students are already spending on screens isn't the enemy of literacy — but the opportunity? This week, we sit down with Julia Rivard, founder of Shoelace Learning , to talk about what it really looks like to leverage technology in order to prioritize engagement for older striving readers. In this episode, we get into: the relationship between fun and rigor why turning away fro...

Literacy improvement can't rest on the shoulders of a single teacher. So what does it actually look like to make secondary literacy a shared responsibility across an entire school or district? This week, Emily Russin from the HILL for Literacy joins us to dig into what a truly collaborative approach to adolescent literacy looks like — from the classroom to the district level. Emily takes us th...

We throw around the phrase "research-based" a lot in education — but is it actually enough? This week, Dr. Mary Schreuder from The Achievement Network (ANet) joins us to unpack the difference between research-based and evidence-based practice, walk us through her evidence-based literacy curriculum checklist, and talk about what meaningful data and assessment really look like for older re...

There's a growing narrative in education that adapting text for struggling readers means lowering the bar. This week, we're pushing back on that — hard. We sat down with Ethan Pierce from Adaptive Reader to unpack what accessibility actually means in the context of literacy — and why the current conversation about access vs. rigor is missing the mark. Together, we dig into the real relatio...

In this episode, we dive in to what it takes to build a true literacy ecosystem in middle and high school. Melanie McDermott and Louise Baigelman sit down with Dr. Sarah Holbrook, Director of Humanities in Kingston City Schools and co-creator of the SUNY New Paltz Science of Reading Microcredential, to discuss the infrastructure of adolescent literacy. Learn more about Dr. Holbrook's work at:...

What would it look like if we truly went all in on adolescent literacy? What if grades 3–12 received the same time, resources, and investment we've dedicated to K–3? In Episode 2, host Melanie McDermott sits down with adolescent literacy expert Shira Engel to unpack the Future of Adolescent Literacy Vision Paper — a bold roadmap built by the leading voices in secondary literacy. We've hear...

Seventy percent of 8th graders in this country are not reading on grade level. It's a statistic that should stop us in our tracks — and yet, for too long, it hasn't. In our inaugural episode, we sit down with adolescent literacy expert Louise Baigelman and middle school educator Shira Engel to tackle one of the most urgent and underserved challenges in education: adolescent literacy. What...