IN MARCH 2000, TOWNSEND PRESS BECAME NADE'S FIRST CORPORATE SPONSOR.
To highlight this event, the Newsletter thought readers would like to know more about this company and so interviewed two company spokespersons: John Langan and Janet Goldstein (TP).
NADE: Tell us a little about the history of your company and how you got to be where you now are.
TP: The company was started by John Langan, an established textbook author who wanted to have more influence over the total process of creating textbooks for developmental students. TP began with one book, Ten Steps to Improving College Reading Skills, in 1988 and since then has developed two highly successful series of reading and vocabulary books, among other texts. The small size of the company has enabled TP to keep its prices very low: the reading books sell for $18 net; vocabulary books for less than $8 net.
NADE: How big is the company, and what kinds of things does the company do in addition to publishing developmental textbooks?
TP: The company has ten full-time employees. In addition to regular revisions of the reading and vocabulary books, the company has several other commitments:
- Continuing the TP Scholarship Contest. Open to all students who are taking or have recently taken developmental reading and writing courses, this contest makes available at least $21,000 in awards a year for students who write an essay on what they have done to overcome the challenges they have faced and to take charge of their lives.
- Developing a highly readable series of realistic novels for inner-city students. The first half-dozen books in this series (which we call the Bluford series; they are set in a high school named after Guion Bluford, the first African-American astronaut) will be published this fall.
- Developing a series of effective reading exit and reading placement tests. TP feels the Nelson-Denny and other reading tests are unfair to many students. These widely-used tests purport to test students' reading levels, but the tests have such unrealistically high vocabulary levels that they wind up testing students on vocabulary rather than on comprehension. Many developmental students have already had too many unfair experiences in their lives; they should not have to have their abilities measured by tests that represent another kind of unfairness.
NADE: What do you see as the value of developmental education to the individual students and their families, to higher education in general, and to society at large?
TP: Developmental education can serve as a kind of saving grace, giving students a second chance to master important learning skills they were not ready or able to learn at an earlier point in their lives. We all need second chances along the way, and developmental education can be one of those chances. Working together, teachers and publishers can help students learn the skills they need to succeed in college and to become productive members of society. Such goals speak for themselves!
NADE: How do you see building relationships between publishers and NADE as something that can ultimately help our students find better opportunities for success?
TP: The closer the connection between publishers and teachers who are working on the front lines, the better the teaching materials that publishers can make available to teachers.
NADE: What made Townsend decide to become a corporate sponsor for NADE? Do you see the relationship between publishers and NADE as beneficial for the publishers as well as for NADE?
TP: Publishers and NADE teachers share a goal: to do as good a job for students as they can. In this regard, publishers and teachers are both blessed; while all too many people must devote their careers to making widgets, as it were, we have the chance to help other human beings realize more of their potential. We are remarkably privileged to have such important human work to do.
NADE: What are your most popular books and programs? Do you have some books or programs that you think should be more popular that instructors should examine? Are we missing something by not using the computer programs that go with the books?
TP: The TP reading and vocabulary series are the most successful such series on the college market today. We truly believe that instructors who have not tried our materials will be very pleased with the results. We invite any instructor who has not used the TP books to try them with one class; we will send to the instructor free of charge all the books needed for that class. To arrange for a free set of books, call Townsend Press at 1-800-772-6410 and leave a message for Janet Goldstein, or e-mail Janet at janet.goldstein@townsendpress.com.
TP does have a series of computer mastery tests that accompany the reading and vocabulary books. In fact, a CD-ROM containing over 500 tests for the books is available at no charge by calling TP. The tests are unique in providing feedback for answers: in other words, they teach as well as test.
Such computer materials are a helpful supplement, but the editors at Townsend Press strongly believe that a student best becomes a skilled reader by practicing essential reading skills with a book, not by sitting in front of a computer screen. One learns a skill by practicing that skill, moving from one activity and/or test in a book to the next. There is no panacea that takes the place of the hard book work that must be done by the student and the teacher. One sits down with a book that effectively teaches essential comprehension skills and one rolls up one's sleeves and works hard, and gradually all the hard work and practice and feedback on the practice will result in true and lasting learning. There is no magic bullet; the secret is a good book (the responsibility of the publisher) and a lot of hard work on the part of the teacher and the student.
NADE: How does Townsend see the field of developmental education progressing in the next few years? Do you have some future plans you would like to tell us about?
TP: Whatever form developmental education takes, TP believes that the heart of the matter will remain this: that students will become better readers by working with skills books that engage their interest, that treat them with dignity and affirm their self-worth, and that teach in clear and effective fashion the skills they need to become independent learners and to succeed in college. TP's goal will remain what it has been for the last ten years: to create skills books that truly help students learn.
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