Summer Institute

The LSU Writing Project (LSU WP), in conjunction with The National Writing Project (NWP), is dedicated to improving student writing and the teaching of writing in the nation's schools and beyond. Through this partnership with the NWP, LSU WP extends opportunities for local teachers, principals, and other educators to engage in intensive writing professional development through graduate course offerings. Despite rapid changes in communication, in literacy education, and in teaching, writing remains a powerful mechanism and a powerful way to transform lives.

Given the current state of literacy education, the Writing Project directors decided to use the 2024 summer to connect with schools and educators and learn about their writing professional development needs. The LSU WP Invitational Summer Institute, 2024, was by invitation only and took place on Mallard Island. Sulentic Dowell, teacher consultants, Ali McMillian and Hayley Lindner, LSU alum, Brittany Pike, and doctoral students, Bethany Hager, and Laurie Salvail, spent a week participating in, "Sowing the Seeds of Interdisciplinary Connections to Water: Literacy, Stewardship, and Place-based Learning." The LSU team spent a week in early August engaged in an intensive writing retreat, collaborating on possible research, grants, and manuscripts, aligned to the Earnest Oberholtzer Foundation's Mission.  

The LSU WP Co-Directors invite interested educators to apply to the LSU WP Invitational Summer Institute, a two-week intensive professional development experience offered through six (6) hours of graduate credit. The Invitational Summer Institute includes two (2) co-requisite graduate courses:

• EDCI 7311.1 Institute I
• EDCI 7311.2 Institute II

If interested in becoming a NWP teacher consultant, submit a letter of application by email addressing why you would be an excellent candidate to participate in the Invitational Summer Institute. Include your name, title, contact information of two individuals who can serve as references. Submit your letter, contact information, and references to Margaret-Mary Sulentic Dowell or Courtney A. Brown.