Georgia Center for Early Language and Literacy opens

A new state center with a mission to improve reading skills of young children by training teachers to teach them officially opened Thursday.

The Georgia Center for Early Language and Literacy at Georgia College in Milledgeville is Gov. Nathan Deal’s initiative. He allocated a total of $5.1 million for the center in the 2017 and 2018 state budgets.

Deal and his wife, Sandra, a former teacher and co-chair of the Georgia Literacy Commission, attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony Thursday, after an inaugural summit on early learning and literacy.

The center convenes educational leaders from higher education, early childhood education programs and teacher preparation programs to improve the state’s ability to train teachers to teach young kids to read.

Children who can’t read proficiently by third grade risk falling behind in other subjects in later years, since reading is fundamental to learning.

About the Author

Ty Tagami

Ty Tagami is a staff writer for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Since joining the newspaper in 2002, he has written about everything from hurricanes to homelessness. He has deep experience covering local government and education, and can often be found under the Gold Dome when lawmakers meet or in a school somewhere in the state.

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