Building a School Community That Reads is a practical strategy for radically improving elementary public schools in Chicago. Designs for Change (DFC) assists school and community leaders in creating School Communities That Read.

The School Community That Reads places first priority on preparing students to read complex information with understanding (from literature to science problems) and to enjoy reading. While elementary schools must pursue a number of academic goals for their students, teaching students to read well should be the first priority, since reading competence opens the door to learning other skills and subjects. Students who leave elementary school reading well have an excellent chance to graduate from high school, to pursue further education, and to obtain good jobs.

The School Community That Reads is grounded in the best available research about how to achieve this goal. Research about urban schools where students learn to read well indicates that these schools do not teach reading as an isolated set of skills; reading means understanding what you read, predicting what will happen next, reading to solve a problem, writing about what you have read, reading for a purpose.

A closely related priority in building a School Community That Reads is to teach students the social skills that they need to function productively in a challenging educational environment. When children master these skills, the school maintains good discipline and children can learn productively while working together actively. Further, mastering social skills prepares students to work effectively as a team and to resolve disputes without violence as they mature.

The basic changes needed to create a School Community That Reads extend beyond the classroom and involve mobilizing schoolwide resources and community resources to pursue changes in five Essential Supports for Student Learning. These five essential supports include:
• Leadership Focused on Success for All Students
• School Environment Supports Learning
• Family-Community Partnerships Support Learning
• Adults Learn and Collaborate
• Quality Learning Activities In and Out of School

DFC’s strategy for fundamental school improvement has the following distinctive features.

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