ReLeah Cossett Lent was a middle and high school English, social studies and journalism teacher before becoming a founding member of a statewide literacy project at the University of Central Florida. While there, she worked with a team to develop Florida’s Reading Endorsement courses and coordinated literacy leadership teams in schools across the state. She is now an international consultant— speaking, writing, and providing workshops on topics ranging from literacy to leadership teams.
While she often provides keynote addresses and one-day workshops, perhaps her most productive work has been multi-day residencies in schools, districts and educational consortiums. For example, she has spent several years working on a collaborative project within neighboring districts for reading teachers and coaches, offering content-based workshops and in-school follow-up. The significant increase in student achievement and teacher leadership demonstrated the effectiveness of such initiatives. She recently facilitated a year-long literacy leadership initiative in a high school, and the principal termed the experience “transformational” in terms of teacher learning and transfer to the classroom. They plan to expand the model throughout the district.
ReLeah Lent has authored ten books on education and has been published in numerous journals, including Educational Leadership, the Journal of Staff Development, and NCTE’s English Journal as well as being a frequent speaker for these organizations and in many schools and districts. Her latest book titles include This is Disciplinary Literacy: Reading, Writing, Thinking and Doing. . .Content Area by Content Area (Corwin, 2016), Common Core CPR: What about the Adolescents Who Struggle. . .or Just Don’t Care? (Corwin, 2013) and Overcoming Textbook Fatigue (ASCD, 2012).