Alameda school is awaiting first lady

Alameda school is awaiting first lady

Laura Bush scheduled to visit Chipman Middle on Thursday to observe

By Susan McDonough, STAFF WRITER
Inside Bay Area

ALAMEDA — School officials here are preparing for a visit Thursday by first lady Laura Bush, a former schoolteacher who has pushed reading and what she calls "character education" while at the White House.

Alameda school officials said Bush is scheduled to visit Chipman Middle School, where an intensive reading program is helping students achieve literacy goals. Classrooms include lessons on respect and other life skills as well as more traditional curriculum.

"It's not a great facility. It's not a beautiful facade or place, it's a diamond," Principal Laurie McLachlan said of the West End school with more than 700 students, many from low-income and racially diverse families.

Less than two years ago nearly 50 percent of students at Chipman were reading below grade level, McLachlan said. After devoting three periods daily to reading, spelling and writing for at-risk students, that rate has dropped to 12 percent, she said.

District spokeswoman Donna Fletcher said she received a call not long ago from reading expert Reid Lyon, chief of child development and behavior at the National Institutes of Health and a partner in the Bush-backed Reach Out and Read program.

Lyon asked for information about Chipman, Fletcher said.

About three weeks ago the school was notified it made the first lady's agenda. She will spend the morning Thursday observing classrooms and visiting children, officials said.

The White House Press Office could not confirm Laura Bush's visit late Monday. The first lady is scheduled to be in Southern California on Wednesday, according to The Associated Press.