Farmington School Principals Shannon Cantrell and Julia Williams received word on Thursday
that Folsom Elementary and Farmington Middle School have been selected as recipients of the 2022 RISE School Award by the Arkansas Department of Education-Division of Elementary and Secondary Education. Both schools will be recognized this July at the 2022 Arkansas
Department of Education Summit being held at the Hot Springs Convention Center. Folsom
Elementary School and Farmington Middle School are two of only ten schools in Arkansas receiving this award for excellence in literacy.
The Reading Initiative for Student Excellence, RISE Arkansas, fosters a culture of reading by
coordinating a statewide reading campaign with community partners, parents, and teachers to
establish the importance of reading in communities, homes, and schools. The first goal of RISE
Arkansas is to “sharpen the focus and strengthen literacy instruction.” RISE training was
developed in 2017 to bring evidence-based teaching practices to the classroom.
RISE Arkansas recognizes schools that have successfully implemented the RISE literacy
practices.
Farmington had two of the 31 schools in the state to submit an application for the
award and were two of 22 schools that advanced to the second round of the application
process. A team of RISE specialists spent a day visiting looking for schoolwide implementation
of RISE strategies and practices aligned with the science of reading based on a rubric that
looked closely at the reading instructional shifts across twelve different areas. Both campuses
excelled in literacy instruction and were selected as 2022 RISE Award winners!
The RISE team gave this feedback after their visit: ”The administration in the district has done a
good job leading the RISE implementation and the staff has increased the effectiveness of
literacy education by being open to questions and feedback and training to improve literacy.
These schools are a great example of combining the PLC process and RISE training and
implementing it for the benefit of students.”
Congratulations to the staff, students, and leadership at Folsom and FMS!
Thank you to our teachers for putting in the hours and effort needed to positively impact literacy success for our students, our school, our community, and our state!
For full press release click here.