After 11 years with Manhattan Beach Unified School District, Deborah Hofreiter was recently hired for a one-year district-wide writing and literacy position.
The position will be funded by a $95,000 grant from the Manhattan Beach Education Foundation. At the end of the year, the position’s effectiveness will be evaluated. “The hope would be to sustain it,” said Susan Warshaw, executive director of the foundation.
The district will then decide whether to pursue funding again. “If it’s successful, we can apply to have it carry on to next year and years beyond,” said Carolyn Seaton, executive director of educational services at the district, adding, “We’ll need to show the progress that we’re making and what we’re able to accomplish next year.”
The position was publicized to individuals already working within the district – five individuals applied. “We were confident knowing the talents of our own teaching staff, that we could find the right fit right here within MBUSD,” Seaton said. Had the panel not found a suitable candidate, she said, it would have opened the position to others outside the district.
The five applicants were interviewed by a panel of secondary and elementary school teachers and administrators, and also had to submit writing samples.
The position was created to make possible a more comprehensive and consistent writing focus, Seaton said. “We feel like we have incredibly strong teachers, but we have not had a consistent district focus at each of the elementary schools that’s articulated in middle school and high school in the area of writing,” she said, adding, “Students who are able to write well are going to be successful in any career of their choosing later on.”
Seaton noted that all the applicants were qualified, but Hofreiter had the most relevant depth of experience across all grade levels. “The position is K through 12,” she said. “Ms. Hofreiter has worked with all of those age groups.”
Hofreiter will be responsible for planning and developing a comprehensive district wide writing program. “Writing is very subjective, and to have a program where it’s similar for everybody is tricky,” she said.
Hofreiter will encourage writing across the curriculum, implementing writing assignments in subjects that don’t usually include writing, like math and sciences.
She will also lead the writing articulation committee and help put together a notebook distributed to teachers district-wide filled with “anchor papers,” or graded student papers that show exemplary, mediocre or poor papers for each grade level. “We would like to see those being used more, so my A, is your A, is her A,” she said.
After working with high school students as a coordinator for AVID, a college readiness program, Hofreiter knows what colleges are looking for. “I can look back all the way and scaffold it so we have comprehensive and sequential curriculum, taking little kindergartens all the way through senior (year) in a consistent program where they always know what we’re talking about as far as writing terms and expectations,” she said.
Prior to this, Hofreiter worked as an English teacher at Mira Costa High School. Her favorite class she taught – “my baby,” she said – was the 12th grade English class, “Noir Literature in Los Angeles.” Created in 2007, the class was on a very specific subject, (noir literature, the detective genre) and only a semester long, preparing the students for college courses, Hofreiter said.
The class studied novelists Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Gary Phillips, and Denise Hamilton. Hamilton guest spoke for the class twice. “It was such a good class,” Hofreiter said with a smile.
Before joining Manhattan Beach Unified, Hofreiter worked at many schools in Beverly Hills, teaching English and computer skills and working with students in special education.
Hofreiter is grateful to the education foundation for making this opportunity available. “For us to be able to add a position, when other districts are slicing to the bone, that is a major thanks to the (foundation),” she said, adding, “They are tireless.”
