Past Recipients
Best Practices for the Teaching of Writing from Past Recipients
Learn best more about practices from past Bob Costas Grant recipients
Recipients of the 2009 Bob Costas Grants for the Teaching of Writing
Middle States Region
Shannon Handley and Joanne Dineen of Bay Shore High School in Bay Shore, N.Y., coordinate the Ethnic Pen, an annual conference on ethnic writing that has earned local and national recognition for its success in motivating students to find and express their unique voices through writing.
Western Region
Teri Klass of Marshall High School in Los Angeles has incorporated special education students into her Humanitas Global Studies small learning community, bringing a population that has often been excluded into a program of rigor. Her students' assignments include debates, multimedia projects and extracurricular trips.
Southwest Region
Andrea Perrino of Rio Rancho Mid-High School and Beth Cramer of Mountain View Middle School in Rio Rancho, N.M., coordinate a Web-based writer's showcase to publish students' work and encourage them to submit essays or poetry.
Midwest Region
Colleen Ruggieri of Canfield High School in Canfield, Ohio, believes in having her students "write for real." She incorporated a local experimental farm in her teaching. Her students studied the writings of the American Transcendentalists and she took them on a field trip to the farm to research environmental and agricultural issues.
New England Region
Pascalia Mattioli of South High Community School in Worcester, Mass., has emphasized the arts as her students read and write in her language arts classroom. Using art projects to complement the reading and writing curriculum has helped many students for whom English is not their first language.
Southern Region
Brent Wiley of Brandon Alternative School in Seffner, Fla., challenged his students to take up their pens and create the first student newspaper published in Hillsborough County. Wiley's students accepted his challenge and published their first issue — complete with fashion tips, reviews of hip-hop and pop music releases, and editorials about school conditions.
Recipients of the 2008 Bob Costas Grants for the Teaching of Writing
Middle States Region
Beth Breau and Richard Lorenzo of St. Benedict's Preparatory School in Newark, N.J., teach a 10th-grade course called Newark Studies, in which students investigate topics important to their city, including AIDS, race relations, downtown development and Newark's 1967 civil disorders.
Western Region
Art Rzasa of Corvallis High School in Corvallis, Mont., founded "Classroom Without Walls," where students engage in experiential learning. After embarking on educational backpacking trips, students then research, write, and produce short documentaries for classroom use.
Southwest Region
Nancy Sladky teaches literature and writing at John S. Davidson Fine Arts Magnet School, an inner-city public school in Augusta, Ga. Here she sponsors an active poetry and fiction writing club, publishes a literary journal, holds events to showcase student writing and has collaborated with the library to establish a creative writing blog for students.
Midwest Region
Katherine Plager of Thornton Township High School in Harvey, Ill., teaches her students how to write formal laboratory reports following the scientific method. This rubric and step-by-step procedure for constructing laboratory reports has made writing accessible to students previously uncomfortable with writing.
New England Region
B. Lynn Frazier, a reading and language arts consultant at Windham High School in Willimantic, Conn., began a poetry unit focusing on memoirs a few years ago. Her group of students, the self-named Young Poets, responded with passion and skill, performing their work in a local café and publishing it online. Frazier was also chosen as one of 150 Freedom Writer Teachers by Erin Gruwell.
Southern Region
Mary Grace Bagaoisan and Roseo T. Caburian Jr. of Lakeview Centennial High School in Garland, Texas, teaches English as a second language and helps build writing skills and academic confidence among students whose limited English proficiency threaten to keep them from staying in school or considering college.
Recipients of the 2007 Bob Costas Grants for the Teaching of Writing
Middle States Region
Timothy Adams is a teacher at W.E.B. DuBois Academic High School, a transfer alternative high school in Brooklyn, where he uses hip-hop music in his writing workshops to teach students about literary techniques.
Western Region
Mary L. Richards, an English teacher at Eagle River High School in Eagle River, Alaska, uses her e-zine, Northern Lit, to help students celebrate and preserve the indigenous Native Alaskan way of shaping stories.
Southwest Region
Pamela B. Cordova teaches seventh- and eighth graders at Mescalero Apache School, a Bureau of Indian Affairs grant school in New Mexico. She will use her grant to help students write, edit, and publish the biographies of the elder members of the Mescalero tribe.
Midwest Region
Melissa Handler of Scott Highlands Middle School in Apple Valley, Minnesota encourages students' creative writing efforts by displaying their work on a "Wall of Words," a prominent wall in the school dedicated to showcasing students' writing and artwork.
New England Region
Kate Gardoqui teaches AP® English Language Composition and AP English Literature and Composition at Noble High School in North Berwick, Maine. She will use her grant to help students research and write "Beyond Graduation," a collection of articles on what it takes to succeed in college.
Southern Region
Joseph W. Underwood has been teacher for 21 years at Miami Senior High School, where he built a television production studio by raising funds from the community. He oversees students as they produce a daily live newscast for the school's 3,200 students and staff.
Honorable Mention—Western Region
D'Anza Rene Smith of Roosevelt Middle School in Compton, California engages students in writing by asking them to chronicle their experiences in relation to characters from novels.
Read full biographies of the 2007 recipients (.pdf/55K).
Recipients of the 2006 Bob Costas Grants for the Teaching of Writing
Middle States Region
John Cornillon, an English teacher at Harbor City High School in Baltimore, Maryland, an inner-city alternative public high school, helped his students express their true voices in a way that resonated powerfully with their peers and invigorated school teachers and administrators.
Midwestern Region
Jennifer Budenski, co-creator of the Artful Writing Program at the Hopkins Alternative Program Off-Campus Pavilion in Hopkins, Minnesota, guides at-risk students as they develop literary skills through authentic response to artwork.
New England Region
Nancy Barile, an English teacher at Revere High School in Revere, Massachusetts, embodies her conviction that good writing is a joy and an asset for any career path, and that students from any background can learn to write well.
Southern Region
Billie J. Smith, chair of the English department at McKinley High School in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, helped students cope with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina through journaling and an ongoing documentary project.
Southwestern Region
Mary Beth Britton, a language arts teacher at Pecos High School in Pecos, New Mexico, co-leads an oral history project that partners students with senior citizens and results in a book of the seniors' life stories.
Western Region
Callen Taylor, a history teacher at Mission High School in San Francisco, California, leads the Mission Writers Project, a multifaceted program involving 70 percent of juniors and seniors and several local arts organizations.
New England Honorable Mention
James Siegel of Massabesic High School in Waterboro, Maine, and Wayne Barr of Tantasqua Regional Senior High School in Fiskdale, Massachusetts.