In 2015, Children’s Literacy Initiative (CLI) leveraged a U.S. Department of Education Investing in Innovation (i3) Scale-Up grant to partner with Broward County Public Schools (BCPS) in seven of the district’s highest-needs schools. The results:

• CLI-served schools accelerated more students to grade-level (as measured by the FSA) than the district’s average.

• Five of the seven BCPS schools showed double-digit increases in FSA third grade reading scores over the three years of CLI implementation.

• As important, CLI-served schools helped more students accelerate out of the lowest performance band when measured against the district average.

Because of this success and a very strong, collaborative working relationship with all levels of BCPS – from district to school to classroom – the district invested close to $1 million to amplify our partnership by including an additional seven Title 1 elementary schools in Broward County.

CLI continues to serve these seven elementary schools thanks to renewed district investment, together with philanthropic support. Even during the pandemic, as BCPS transitioned from full virtual, to hybrid, to in-person instruction, CLI leveraged its technology platforms and coaches to provide tailored support for BCPS’s teachers and students.

While the district has made significant investment in the program, CLI seeks community philanthropic support as it continues to improve early literacy outcomes and ensure early grade students can read proficiently.

Scroll down to explore funding opportunities for Broward, to discover CLI’s volunteer leaders in the county, and to read about Broward educators’ experiences in their own words.

Your philanthropic support will help CLI continue to build on more than 30 years of experience partnering with educators, such as those in Broward, to transform instruction in underserved communities to help students become powerful readers, writers and thinkers.

Philanthropic support to help close the funding gap in a $1 million, primarily district-funded project

Through this project, CLI is providing coaching and training around early literacy instruction to more than 170 educators. CLI’s goal is to improve reading outcomes for approximately 3,300 students in Broward during the 2020-21 school year, whether those children are studying in physical or virtual classrooms.

Participating schools include:

• Broward Estates Elementary, Lauderhill
• Deerfield Beach Elementary, Deerfield Beach
• Morrow Elementary, North Lauderdale
• Oakridge Elementary, Hollywood
• Rock Island Elementary, Fort Lauderdale
• Tedder Elementary, Deerfield Beach
• Village Elementary, Sunrise

In the 2020-21 school year, through additional funding sources, CLI also continued to develop Plantation Elementary as a Broward Model School for early literacy, and served Charles Drew and North Lauderdale schools.

Match-funding for a multi-year federal Education Innovation and Research (EIR) project targeting improved kindergarten readiness

Beginning in the 2021-22 school year, CLI will provide training and coaching for teachers to implement its Blueprint for Early Learning curriculum in Broward County Pre-K sites (both district-operated and community-based) and build the capacity of district leaders to sustain the work following the EIR grant period (through school year 2023-24). Backed by more than $2M in multi-year federal EIR investment, CLI seeks to raise $300,000 in total match funding for the three project years.

CLI has deep experience stewarding matching contributions from individuals, corporations, and foundation donors who choose to maximize their impact with federal grant projects such as this.

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