As a reading specialist, Susan Ruckdeschel pioneered many school and district writing initiatives, beginning in 1991 with the school’s first school writing club in the Naples Jr./Sr. High School in the Finger Lakes Region of New York state. It was the breeding ground for the student peer coaching model used in her book Peer Coaching for Adolescent Writers, quickly expanding to other districts both inside and outside of classroom instruction to include the Glens Falls Middle School in Glens Falls, NY; The Booker T. Washington High School in Norfolk, VA; and the Hawthorne PEARLS School in Yonkers, NY.
Ruckdeschel is completing a doctoral program in educational leadership at the University of Phoenix, with a focus on curriculum and instruction. She holds several NYS teaching certifications, including Reading K-12, English 7-12, Classroom N-6, School District Administrator, and Gifted and Talented Extension. Ruckdeschel has taught and operated within each of these certification areas throughout many years of teaching and consulting in public schools for organizations, including the National Urban Alliance, Pearson Learning Group, and Houghton Mifflin. As founder of Literacy Solutions, she consults in districts throughout the country on curriculum and professional development, while teaching as adjunct instructor at the University of Phoenix Online. Ruckdeschel continues to maintain ongoing writing workshops for student writers in the Mid-Hudson Valley region of New York state, training them to be effective peer coaches while nurturing their budding writing efforts. Ruckdeschel graduated from Nazareth College of Rochester in 1991 with a Masters of Science in Education.
