Response to Sold a Story: A Designer’s Perspective

At that point, [Bob Sweet] wrote: “Dame Clay looked at me with steely eyes and said: ‘We will not change a thing in our program. But we will modify our description of Reading Recovery to comply with the law.’”  

- Emily Hanford, Sold a Story

 Wrapping a broken bone in a Band-Aid®, I’m certain, doesn’t work. 

I couldn’t stop thinking about the potential feeling of residual responsibility from the team who crafted those updates to the description Marie Clay was referring to and their part in its mass communication.

“Did anyone question it? Or object? Or push back on that even qualifying as a solution?” I thought to myself. 

Listening to Sold a Story with our team of language arts curriculum developers and consultants, I continued to think, “What we do really is unique. We’re your ‘old-school’ curriculum experts with ‘new-school’ solutions.” Even though they’re not really new at all — the science has been around for a while. 

We craft our products [with love] based on accurate, vetted, scientific research. It’s not hidden or locked away. Have you read Uncovering? It’s translated into everything we do, not just our descriptions. The top-down decisions at Logic of English are grounded in humility, and because I am part of a culture like that, I get to truly believe in the work that comes across my desk.

Everything we publish goes through proper checks and balances to ensure quality, accessibility and the aforementioned accuracy, so that you can truly trust it when it comes across your desk [or device] too. 

Pivotal Change Comes from the Inside

Creating change doesn’t come from the outside in or the top down. Real change is made by truly adapting from the inside out. 

By doing better every step of the way.

I feel so fortunate to work for a company comprised of passionate individuals striving to support accuracy and equity in reading education. We are working together towards reversing a seemingly never-ending literacy crisis — with absolutely no intention of stopping or slowing down until reading and writing are no longer siloed skillsets of the privileged but rather an understood basic human right.

A right that is needed to function successfully in today’s society. 

We’re here to do better.  

“Do the Best You Can Until You Know Better. Then When You Know Better, Do Better.” - Maya Angelou

🙌 You heard the lady. 🙌