Learning to Read by Empowerment and Self-Esteem

(Nogales, Arizona) According to Arizona's Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS), a standards-based test, student performance caused the local Wade Carpenter Middle School to be ranked as "under-performing" by the Arizona Department of Education.

Wade Carpenter Principal Lisa Montiel indicated that eighth-grade reading scores are a weakness that dragged down the AIMS results.

To improve the situation, Montiel has placed more emphasis on reading. Also,

All the teachers are working to empower their students and improve their self-esteem, Montiel said.

Montiel believes that creating a "long-lasting, positive environment" will result in higher test scores.

Call me uninformed, but I don't understand the relationship between empowerment and reading nor self-esteem and reading. Logically, one would think that the way to improve reading scores is to teach the students how to read.

Of course, one must ask what happens to those students who never learn to read but become empowered and acquire high self-esteem?