Dr. Beryl Irene Bailey has 35 years of educational experience, within Connecticut; New Haven, Bridgeport, Hartford and now, Bloomfield CT Public Schools. Along with being CEO of from Pages to Pedagogy, LLC, author and a national literacy consultant, she is the Director of Literacy for Bloomfield, CT Public Schools. Dr. Bailey served 25 of her 35 years working for the Hartford, CT Schools as a speech/language pathologist, literacy coach, turn-around specialist, school principal and Director of Literacy. She worked for New Haven, CT for four years as a regular and special education teacher and one year for Bridgeport as a speech-language pathologist. Not only is Bailey a public school advocate, but she is a product of the New Haven, CT Public Schools.
Dr. Bailey received her Doctorate Degree in Curriculum Development and Systemic Change from Nova Southeastern University, Ft. Lauderdale, FLA in 2003. Her applied dissertation emphasized the use of multicultural children’s literature coupled with the structured read aloud process as a vehicle to improve reading and listening comprehension and social emotional development and vocabulary skills in elementary children. She received her M.S. Degree in Communication Disorders from Southern Connecticut State University, 1987 New Haven, CT and her B.A. Degree in Special and Elementary Education from Simmons College, 1981, Boston, Massachusetts. Dr. Bailey is a licensed speech-language pathologist in the state of Connecticut, holds her Certificate of Clinical Competence (CCC) from the American Speech-Language and Hearing Association (ASHA), teaching certificates in special and elementary education and speech-language and hearing and the administration and supervision certificate. She also holds a Certificate of Completion from Harvard University’s School of Education Urban Leader’s Academy, 2006.
Dr. Bailey is the author of the CLOSE Reading process, Toolkit for CLOSE Reading and creator of Bailey’s meta-textual markers. She has a solid foundation in both application and scholarship of literacy and numeracy and has self-published several language-based programs that have been successfully implemented within school districts in Connecticut. In January 2017 she had an article, Feeding Two Birds with One Worm: Using close reading strategies to intertwine literacy and numeracy published in Literacy Today, the magazine of the International Literacy Association. She has also trained educators in Connecticut, Oklahoma, Minnesota and South Carolina in the new College and Career Ready Standards.
Dr. Bailey has presented at several local, state, and national literacy conferences; 59th Annual Conference Connecticut Reading Association, National Black Association for Speech-Language-Hearing, and the 48th, 55th, & 56th Annual Conference International Reading Association. In May 2014, she taught an institute at the 59th Annual Convention of the International Reading Association.
Dr. Bailey has received numerous awards for her work in education. In 2002 she was a finalist for Hartford Educator of the Year. In 2005 she received the Wilbur Cross Award: Humanities Project Director of the Year from the Connecticut Humanities Council and in 2009 she received the Nicholas Criscuolo Reading Award for Administrators from the Connecticut Reading Association. In 2011 she received Honorable citations from the Mayor of Hartford for her work in education.
Of all her accomplishments, Dr. Bailey is most proud of her daughter, Virginia Bailey-Barnes and her niece-daughter, Darnita Kylene Bailey. Virginia has received her B.S. Degree from Southern Connecticut State University in 2007 in Interpersonal and Relational Communications and her M.S. Degrees from Central Connecticut State University in 2009 in Educational Leadership and School Counseling in 2012. She is a national certified counselor. Virginia currently resides and works in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband Raymond. Darnita is a licensed cosmetologist of 18 years. She was graduated from the Dudley School of Beauty in Greensboro, North Carolina in 2000. Darnita is a master haircutter, and weavologist, specializing in natural hair.