State Chiefs Leading: Elevating Learning and Literacy Outcomes

State Chiefs Leading: Elevating Learning and Literacy Outcomes

“When we talk about literacy outcomes, data, policy, and programs all matter. But what children experience every day are people….Lasting change happens when systems are aligned, implementation is thoughtful, communities are engaged, and the people closest to the children have the support they need to do their best work.”  
– Bill Hite, Ed.D., Bezos Family Foundation

Moderated by Bill Hite, Ed.D., President of the Bezos Family Foundation, this session brought together four state chiefs who are driving literacy gains in their states: Jenna Conway, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Virginia Department of Education; Susana Córdova, Ed.D., Commissioner of Education, Colorado Department of Education; Katie Jenner, Ed.D., Secretary of Education, Indiana Department of Education; and Charlene Russell-Tucker, Commissioner of Education, Connecticut State Department of Education. 

Bill Hite began by asserting: “If we want better outcomes for children, we have to support the entire ecosystem that makes those outcomes possible.” Each of the four chiefs echoed this sentiment in her own way, whether it was Charlene Russell-Tucker saying that “education is a collective effort” or Katie Jenner highlighting the “army of people” in Indiana working “in partnership with our incredible educators and education leaders.”  

Hite went on to note: “State chiefs occupy a uniquely important vantage point. They help shape policy, but they also understand the realities of implementation. They are working within the opportunities and constraints unique to their respective states, using data to identify bright spots and gaps, and making hard decisions about where support and resources are needed most.” 

Each chief spoke in turn about her own state’s context, progress, and challenges with respect to early learning and early literacy outcomes. Here are a few highlights. Watch the recording for a fuller picture.  

“While our political context or even our governance structures and pressures may look very different…all of us are united and are laser-focused on serving students and improving outcomes while supporting the education ecosystem that’s around them.” 
– Charlene Russell-Tucker, Connecticut State Dept. of Education 

Engage everyone. “We have built an army of supporters at the community level,” Jenner said, “who believe that they can, and who believe that they must.” Jenner and the other chiefs also noted the roles that legislators, higher education, the business community, and philanthropy all play in making change alongside students, families, and K–12 educators.  

View legislation as an opportunity for aligning goals and resources. As Conway noted in her opening comments, “In Virginia, we’ve been able to use a law as a mechanism to bring people together,” including “to do the deep engagement leading up to the law with a broad set of stakeholders.” Conway shared that the Virginia Literacy Act — passed just a few years ago — was able to be comprehensive, because “we learned from those who went before us.” The other chiefs each discussed the importance of their own state’s laws as a framework for changing policy and practice as well as for allocating resources.  

Pay close attention to implementation. Implementation was mentioned at least a dozen times, and across all five participants in this session. As Russell-Tucker said, “We all want to make sure that what’s legislated gets us the outcome that we’re looking for….Everything lives and dies on effective implementation with fidelity.” Jenner called out “implementing well” as one of the five key facilitators of change in Indiana.  

Screen children early, and use data to drive action. Each of the chiefs talked about the importance of assessment in K–2 and of making the results accessible and actionable for educators and families alike. Virginia has built a comprehensive data system that connects early childhood data from 3,000 sites across the state with an age 3-grade 8 language and literacy screener, as well as with the statewide system for kindergarten readiness. The ultimate test of that system, said Conway, will be “can we, at scale, figure out how to use the data to support the educators to meet the individual needs of all of the children in each classroom.”  

Keep your foot on the gas — and recognize that change takes time. Each of the chiefs expressed a sense of urgency about closing the gaps that exist for learners furthest from opportunity and furthest from proficiency. Jenner described this as “my foot’s on the gas pedal so hard, go, go, go.” Córdova agreed: “This is not a time to take a foot off the gas.” At the same time, Córdova said, reflecting on Colorado’s recent investments in early literacy, “These are the kind of investments where we’re planting seeds. We will see the fruit and the blossom and the shade down the line.”  

Invest in early childhood to grow strong readers by third grade. All five education leaders named investing in learners’ earliest years as a high priority and drew a through-line from those investments to early school success. Córdova praised the bipartisan investments Colorado has made in universal preschool for all families and full-day free kindergarten in public schools, as well as the discretionary Early Literacy Grant that is showing “enormous gains” for participating schools. Russell-Tucker described Connecticut’s investment in early childhood education — with an endowment — as well as her department’s work with the state’s Office of Early Childhood to develop a comprehensive, birth through grade 12 vision for a high-quality literacy system that leads to improved outcomes for students. Conway, noting the strong quantifiable effect of kindergarten readiness on third-grade reading, shared her hopes that Virginia’s comprehensive data system will “build the case for more early investment.” 

As the conversation drew to a close, Hite invited the panelists to offer a final takeaway.  

• Superintendent Conway highlighted the importance of urgency, partnerships, and scale. The promise of public education, she said, demands that we ask: “How do we make the most out of every minute, every aspect of a child and then a student’s early childhood and K–12 education experience…with systems that are designed to serve and lift those furthest from opportunity?” 
• Commissioner Córdova emphasized the systemic and collaborative nature of the work: “It is so important that there is strong policy, strong support, strong implementation — and that it’s not just the schools…we need to be partnering with families, with the business community, because we really do need everybody to come together to emphasize this.” She added a pitch for every individual to make an impact by supporting kids spending more time “with books in their hands, reading.” 
• Commissioner Russell-Tucker underscored the importance of looking honestly at data and metrics, engaging in honest conversation, listening to students and educators talk about their experiences, and making a “collective commitment” to progress, including building and strengthening partnerships among schools, families, and communities. “We need to recognize what’s not going well,” she asserted, “but let’s not forget to celebrate the things that are going right, so that we can continue to amplify and elevate those.” 
• Hite brought Secretary Jenner’s voice back into the room, repeating two of her earlier comments about “building an army of those who believe they can, and who believe they must”; and “doing more of what works, and stop doing those things that don’t work.” Finally, he commented, “the only way you know [what works] is having transparent data that are available, that are open, that become the truth-telling some of you talked about earlier.”