Ralph Smith
Managing Director
Campaign for Grade-Level Reading
July 2025 was a banner month for the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading (CGLR). In addition to hosting our 12th annual GLR Week Gathering (the 6th in virtual mode), we hosted our first-ever “deep dive” event — the Technology-Enhanced Teaching & Learning Institute. During the five weeks from June 24 through July 31, 2,200 individuals from 154 CGLR Network communities spanning 49 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and three Canadian Provinces attended and participated in 13 webinar conversations led by 85 thought and practice leaders from field- and sector-leading organizations, associations, and institutions.
The GLR Week lineup featured four webinar conversations affirming the key message driving our post-pandemic work to promote early school success and accelerate academic recovery — support smart decisions to invest in early learning, everyday attendance, and effective tutoring. The other conversations included the capstone to our month-long “deep dive” institute on technology; the launch of our upcoming series exploring how the ongoing “school choice” debates could be complicated by
more parents having access to more options to steer their children’s education experience; and the acknowledgment that our embrace of “learning happens everywhere all the time” affirms the essential roles of the informal learning sector (libraries, aquariums, museums, and zoos) in assuring that learning-rich environments remain abundant and ubiquitous. Building on CGLR’s commitment to disrupt the cycle of poverty, we also partnered with United Way Worldwide and Ascend at the Aspen Institute to spotlight how the United Ways network is harnessing data to inform action to support ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) families who remain economically challenged even with incomes above the poverty level.
The feedback so far (both formal and informal) encourages us to conclude that the month-long programming succeeded in illuminating and advancing CGLR’s commitments to focus on the gaps; to pursue its Civic Action and Advocacy Agenda; and to push back on the dispiriting “nothing worked” narrative by lifting up the progress and promise of the “big bet” solutions.
