Early Literacy Leadership Academy
End of Year Celebration

The Early Literacy Leadership Academy (ELLA) is a rigorous two-year certificate program designed to bring together early childhood professionals from public, private and charter school settings who are committed to serving as teacher leaders from their classrooms. Teachers selected to participate in ELLA experience a unique combination of three semesters of monthly seminars and mentored learning plus one semester of independent study, with all four semesters supported by online learning.

The program culminates with an independent, research-informed project conducted by each student, demonstrating their mastery of the curriculum and specific to their area of interest. Below, projects from individuals completing the ELLA program in the years 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 are presented through video submission.

Join us in learning from these incredible presentations and in celebrating each participant’s achievement.

ELLA Projects

Participants are listed alphabetically by last name.

Gabriela Acosta

Gabriela AcostaGabriela earned a B.S. in Interdisciplinary Studies with a bilingual specialization from University of Houston – Clear Lake and an M.S. in School Counseling from Houston Baptist University. Gabriela taught pre-kindergarten for five years in Houston ISD and Fort Bend ISD, and she is currently working with kindergarten and first grade students as a bilingual literacy interventionist at Fort Bend ISD’s Early Literacy Center. Gabriela has completed the Classroom Storytelling and Developing Oral Language in Young Children yearlong mentoring programs and is currently part of the ELLA 4 program.

View Video

View Poster

Grace Baker

Grace BakerGrace Baker is a teacher at Barbara Bush Elementary. She is an ESL teacher and has taught kindergarten for 6 years. Grace is in ELLA Cohort 4.

View Video

View Poster

Hugo Basurto

Hugo BasurtoHugo is currently a Kindergarten teacher at St. Mark’s Episcopal School. Hugo has taught for 7 years and is part of Cohort 5 of Rice University’s ELLA program. While teaching, Hugo has delivered professional developments for Harris County, Region 10, and The Early Childhood Methodist Conference. In his free time, Hugo enjoys college sports and traveling.

View Video

View Poster

Jessica Beechinor

Jessica BeechinorJessica Beechinor is currently a classroom teacher at Travis Elementary where she taught five years in Pre-Kindergarten and is in her fourth year as a Kindergarten teacher. She completed her training in School Literacy & Culture’s (SLC) Classroom Storytelling program in 2017 and was accepted into the Early Literacy Leadership Academy’s fourth cohort in 2018. In her free time, Jessica enjoys traveling, working out and spending time with her husband, 11-month old son, family, and friends.

View Video

View Poster

Laura Bennett

Laura BennettAfter graduating from The University of Texas at Austin in 2005, Laura began her teaching career at Kilpatrick Elementary in Katy ISD where she has taught for 16 years. This is Laura’s 8th year teaching Pre-Kindergarten. Laura is currently a resident of the Early Literacy Leadership Academy Cohort 4 after training in Classroom Storytelling in 2018.

View Video

View Poster

Haley Boone

Haley BooneHaley earned her B.S. in Elementary Education from Mississippi College, and she is in her ninth year of teaching in an ESL Pre-K class at The School at St. George Place. She is honored to be a part of the fourth cohort of ELLA teachers. In her classroom, Haley strives daily to create a space where students feel safe to explore and take risks and where families feel both welcome and invited to participate in their child’s education.

View Video

View Poster

Heather Burleson

Heather BurlesonHeather Burleson (ELLA 4) is responsible for coordinating professional development, curriculum design, and instructional coaching for PK-2nd grade teachers at Promise Community Schools as an Early Childhood Specialist. She earned her Master of Arts in Teaching with distinction from Relay Graduate School of Education in 2015 and was an adjunct professor for the ECE program from 2017-2020. Heather is a Teach For America alum (Houston ’09) and was a Teaching Specialist and Curriculum Coordinator for the first national TFA Summer Institute Early Childhood Hub in 2015 and 2016. She is also a part of Rice SLC’s Advanced Leadership Seminar and has mentored for the Classroom Storytelling program since 2017.

View Video

View Poster

Jill Charrier

Jill CharrierJill Charrier has served as an Instructional Skills Specialist at Hinojosa Primary School in Aldine ISD for the last three years. Prior to that Jill taught Pre-Kindergarten at the same school for fourteen years and was named Teacher of the Year for her campus and selected as Aldine ISD Elementary/Intermediate Teacher of the Year (2012). Some of the most impactful learning endeavors she has embarked on has been ELLA (Cohort 5) and four Fund For Teachers fellowships that brought her to Europe to study storytelling, fairy tales/folktales, yoga, and creativity/curiosity.

View Video

View Poster

Griselda Crousset-Rivera

Griselda Crousset-RiveraGriselda graduated from the University of Phoenix and has been an early childhood educator since 2004. Currently she is a Kindergarten teacher at Mission West Elementary in Fort Bend ISD where she has taught for the past 16 years, 14 of which were spent in the Pre-Kindergarten classroom. She is a participant of ELLA Cohort 5.

View Video

View Poster

Anna Grandes-Rovira

Anna Grandes-RoviraAnna graduated from Universitat Internacional de Catalunya in Barcelona, Spain. She has been a classroom teacher since 2013. She currently teaches at HISD's Ninfa Laurenzo Early Childhood Center as a PreK-3 Spanish Dual-Language teacher. She has been very lucky to be part of ELLA Cohort 5 where she has solidified her beliefs in how fundamental the early childhood years are and how amazing the key role of an Early Childhood teacher is in the future development of the little ones.

View Video

View Poster

Vicente Hernandez

Vicente HernandezVicente Hernandez was born and grew up in Mexico City. He attended a Catholic School in his scholar years, and studied at ITAM where he earned a Bachelor’s degree as a Public Accountant. Vicente used to work as an auditor for the IRS in Mexico until he decided to move to Houston. Here he has been working as a Bilingual Pre-K4 teacher the last 18 years at Spring Branch ISD, at the Bear Boulevard Early Childhood Center. He considers himself very lucky to have had the best mentors who not only helped form him as a teacher, but showed him the greatest pleasure of teaching young children and helping him grow in this field. Vicente’s professional passion is to teach children to enjoy the learning process through playing in the first year of their schooling. He believes there is a great human being in every child. Families, teachers, and society contribute to their success. Vicente’s favorite hobbies are visiting museums and historical sites, and traveling with his family to places to enjoy nature. He likes to spend clear nights watching the sky with his telescope looking for planets and stars. His favorite books are stories based on real events or a good novel.

View Video

View Poster

Emily Hilbig

Emily HilbigEmily teaches PreK 3 at Ripley House Charter School’s Fraga PreK Center, a position she has enjoyed for more than 13 years. She received her MA in Teaching from Relay Graduate School of Education in 2018; was recognized as one of HAAEYC’s Classroom Teachers of the Year in 2011; and received one of the 2020 Marian and Speros Martel Early Childhood Educator Awards. In her free time, she loves reading, traveling, dancing, and spending time with her family and close friends.

View Video

View Poster

Melanie Holmes

Melanie HolmesMelanie Holmes graduated from Texas A&M University in 2007 and began her career in Aldine ISD for seven years, then went to teach Pre-Kindergarten at Sheldon ISD. She is currently one of the Campus Instructional Specialists at Sheldon Early Childhood Academy. She has participated in the Rice Classroom Storytelling program and is currently in Cohort 4 of the ELLA program.

View Video

View Poster

Rosalinda Ibarra

Rosalinda IbarraRosalinda Ibarra is the school librarian at Mistral Early Childhood Center. She has been an educator for 20 years and the librarian at Mistral for 13 of those years. She is in her last year of the ELLA program. In Rosalinda’s Science Literacy Enrichment class, she teaches literature-based science lessons using a variety of hands-on centers, including the use of outdoor learning centers and the school's vegetable and butterfly gardens.

View Video

View Poster

Shannon Lewis

Shannon LewisShannon Lewis has been a Pre-Kindergarten teacher for the past 18 years in Houston area private schools. She completed teacher certification at San Jose State University in California for grades K-8 in 1994. Then she had an opportunity to teach Pre-K when she moved to Houston in 2000, and never looked back! She went to Reggio-Emilia, Italy with her Pre-K team and also to the Boulder Journey School. Through Rice University School Literacy and Culture, she participated in the year-long Classroom Storytelling Project in 2015 and Cohort 4 of the Early Literacy and Leadership Academy from 2018-2021. She has worked with Creative Writing Camp from 2016-2019 as a teacher for children entering Kindergarten. She is passionate about providing children a safe place to discover and grow their own voices.

View Video

View Poster

Sarah Lutz

Sarah LutzSarah Lutz earned her Bachelor of Arts in Education from the University of St. Thomas in 2013. She is a native Houstonian and has been an early childhood teacher for eight years. She currently works as a Prekindergarten teacher at St. Mark’s Episcopal School and has held that position for four years. Previously, Sarah worked at Annunciation Orthodox School for four years. During her first year at Annunciation Orthodox School, she completed Rice School Literacy & Culture’s Classroom Storytelling Project. Since completing the course, she has been using the reading and writing practices in her classroom. During the summers, Sarah enjoys working with students at Creative Writing Camp to further instill a passion for reading and writing in young children. Sarah has been honored to be part of the Early Literacy Leadership Academy for the past three years. She is looking forward to sharing what she has learned with fellow teachers and colleagues. When Sarah is not in the classroom, she enjoys reading, cooking, baking, going to the lake, and spending time with her family and friends.

View Video

View Poster

Amy McConnell

Amy McConnellAmy McConnell has taught both Kindergarten and Pre-Kindergarten at Mission West Elementary in Fort Bend ISD for the last 18 years. She enjoys teaching the youngest learners in the school because of their excitement for learning and exploring their world around them. Amy is currently in the Rice ELLA Program Cohort 5.

View Video

View Poster

Jessica Onwuzuruike

Jessica OnwuzuruikeJessica Onwuzuruike is a current resident of School Literacy & Culture’s Early Literacy Leadership Academy, Cohort Five. She is an ESL kindergarten teacher at Barbara Bush Elementary in Houston ISD where she has taught for 5 years.

View Video

View Poster

Hillery Reyna

Hillery ReynaHillery graduated in 2014 from the University of Texas in San Antonio and currently serves as a dual language Pre-K teacher in Houston ISD at Ninfa Laurenzo ECC. She joined ELLA Cohort 5 in 2019 to expand her knowledge of early childhood education and build leadership skills. Hillery enjoys crafting, traveling, and spending quality time with her family.

View Video

View Poster

Monica Sanchez

Monica SanchezMonica Sanchez currently works at Kujawa Primary International Baccalaureate School in Aldine ISD as a pre-kindergarten, bilingual, virtual teacher. Monica has been part of School Literacy & Culture in programs like Classroom Storytelling, Developing Oral Language, and ELLA Cohort 4.

View Video

View Poster

Jillian Schertle

Jillian SchertleJillian Schertle has been an educator for the past 16 years. Currently, Jillian teaches 1st grade for Presbyterian School; she has previously taught 8 years of Pre-K, 4 years of a Kinder/1st grade loop and 2 years of 1st grade for HISD. Jillian’s passion for storytelling and the importance of early literacy has only grown through her experience with Rice’s School Literacy and Culture; she is a proud member of ELLA Cohort 4.

View Video

View Poster

Amber Taylor

Amber TaylorAmber has been teaching kindergarten at Barbara Bush Elementary for seven years since graduating from Texas State University in December of 2013. Amber is part of The Early Literacy Language Academy (ELLA) Cohort Four.

View Video

View Poster

Anna Tellez

Anna TellezAnna Tellez earned her Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Houston and her Master of Education in Bilingual/Dual Language from the University of St. Thomas. She has been working at Durham Elementary as a pre-kindergarten bilingual educator and during the last years as a Dual Language teacher. Anna has enjoyed and fully appreciated been a part of the 5th ELLA Cohort.

View Video

View Poster

Ellie Thompson

Ellie ThompsonEllie Thompson has been an early childhood educator at Annunciation Orthodox School for eight years. For the past six years she has been teaching pre-kindergarten. In 2018, Ellie joined ELLA Cohort 4 to continue to grow and learn as an educator because literacy development through storytelling is her passion.

View Video

View Poster

Sarah Tovar

Sarah TovarSarah Tovar is an OWL Lab Replication teacher at Ninfa Laurenzo Early Childhood Center in Houston ISD, working with Pre-K 3 and Pre-K 4 students. She has been at Ninfa for 16 years, serving first as a pre-kindergarten teacher, then Instructional Specialist and finally as a combination of OWL Lab Replication teacher and teacher specialist. Sarah is a member of both the ELLA Cohort 4 and the OWL Lab Cohort.

View Video

View Poster

Sarah Tredway

Sarah TredwaySarah Tredway is the Literacy Lab Instructor at Baker Ripley Charter School in Southwest Houston, supporting the development of oral and written language skills for Kindergarten – 2nd grade students. She also is the K-2 Reading Interventionist and previously taught ESL Kindergarten for five years. She was trained in Rice School Literacy and Culture’s Classroom Storytelling and Developing Oral Language program and is an ELLA Cohort 5 member.

View Video

View Poster

Diane Wiener

Diane WienerDiane Wiener facilitates learning in Pre-K (PII) at St. Francis Episcopal School Houston within their Reggio-inspired Primary School division on the Mary Frances Bowles Couper Campus. Mrs. Wiener was a resident teacher in the Classroom Storytelling Project through School Literacy & Culture’s (SLC) program at Rice University's Glasscock School of Continuing Education. During summer break, Diane inspires young writers during Creative Writing Camp in collaboration with Writers in the Schools and SLC, and is a currently a resident teacher in the Early Literacy Leadership Academy (ELLA) Cohort 4.

View Video

View Poster

Your Next Step...

Get Started Here

Body