The Op-Ed Project

In addition to being a teacher, I am an Op-Ed writer about issues of education policy that I care about. So, each year, I teach students how to write persuasive Op-Eds. 

After we study Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, suffragette leaders, and W.E.B. Du Bois from the Progressive Era, I ask them to become modern-day civic reformers, learning how to advocate for change.

We begin by studying models of excellence: Op-Eds from national papers and from my former students. My students then research community issues, write, and edit. Through a sustained focus on writing, my students, all recent immigrants, have an opportunity to develop their voices as writers and advocates. They grapple with word choices and with writing persuasively. Arriving early and staying late, students come with questions, ideas, and updates. Craftsmanship fosters confidence, as well as grit and problem-solving skills. I stay up late, night after night, commenting on their drafts.

To ensure that their voices are heard, I developed a relationship with the local paper which prints a two-page spread of ten of my student’s Op-Eds. 

The community's reaction is wonderful to watch. One student author reported that, when she walked into another class, everyone applauded her. Another student’s teacher asked her to read her Op-Ed aloud. A third was invited by the principal to sit on a panel about the topic of her article. My Op-Ed writers have gone on to attend prestigious journalism summer programs and have been asked to write Op-Eds for other organizations. Most rewarding: many students return to my classroom, months or years later, passionate about another local issue and fired up to write another Op-Ed on the subject.