NNWP
College of Education
Mailstop 288
Univ. of Nevada-Reno
Reno, Nevada 89557

Phone: 775-784-1161
Fax: 775-784-4758

Patty Foncault is our Northern Nevada Writing Project's Inservice Initiative Coordinator; Patty took the NNWP Summer Institute in 2000.  Patty teaches some of the NNWP's most popular spring inservice classes.  She teaches 5th grade at Silver Lake Elementary in Stead, Nevada.

In 2006, Patty attended a National Writing Project workshop in California and returned with the motivation to re-think more effective ways of designing inservices that make a difference to teachers who take them.

It has often been said that the two things you can always count on in life is death and taxes. I would add to that the rising and setting of the sun each day. Although we know for a certainty when the sun disappears at the end of the day that it will reappear again, each new day’s dawning has the ability to configure itself in a variety of ways. Some dawns announce their arrival with a slowly emergent banner of brightness. Others proclaim their majesty with an awe-inspiring palette of pinks and reds on the horizon. Still others slowly rise behind a foggy curtain of clouds. Though each one is unique it its own right, one thing is always constant: it marks the beginning of a new day with the purpose of shedding light, providing the earth with the power source it needs to sustain life.  

Here in Northern Nevada, our Northern Nevada Writing Project has become a “constant” to be counted on, as well. For years we have been a consistent and reliable source for a wide variety of quality in-service classes, focused on effective teaching of authentic writing. However, just as the color of the dawn changes in response to the atmospheric conditions that influence it, our vision of what our in-service program could become has been undergoing a gradual transformation as well. We weren’t completely satisfied with what can sometimes be an occasional “shot-in-the-arm”, or temporary fix, for the teachers in our district. “How can we change the culture of a school?” became the topic of conversation between our director and myself.

One of the first glimpses of what they might become was the combined effort of myself, as a resident T.C., and my supportive principal. Because of a source of grant funds, she was able to offer an attractive stipend to our staff for attending a writing in-service that I was offering at our school. Approximately twelve of our staff took the offer. Out of this came an opportunity to develop a common language and understanding of the writing process. As the idea of this new in-service continues to evolve, we stand at this moment at the threshold of yet something even more innovative and challenging.

With the cooperation and collaboration of the same principal, who is eager to assist her staff in developing an effective writing program, and a writing project site seeking to find ways to be responsive to needs by providing quality school support and continuity, we launch in December of 2006 an exciting pilot project. Corbett Harrison, our NNWP Director, will present instruction based on the 6 writing traits at one of our staff development days. From there, each of the grade levels will focus their PLCs on implementing writing lessons based on the 6 traits writing guide that will be provided. Model lessons will be taught in the classrooms, state readers will score a writing sample from our 4 th and 5th graders, and continuing support will be provided. We look forward to analyzing how our attempt to change the culture of a school turns out. Just as the dawn can change in appearance, but still be the same reliable source of power to the earth, it is our hope that our new vision for in-service as provided by NNWP will become another facet of the same, reliable, quality support we’ve always provided in the past.

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Our Mission

The Northern Nevada Writing Project is committed to improving student writing by promoting the teaching of writing, recognizing teacher expertise and leadership, building a foundation of research, and encouraging teachers as writers.