“A Lever to Ignite Reading Achievement”: Deputy Superintendent Michael Cormack Artwork

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What do great Opportunity Culture educators do, and what have they learned about successfully redesigning school roles to reach all students with excellent teaching? Opportunity Culture Audio pieces bring their voices and advice to you, to help confront some of the stickiest issues facing education.

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“A Lever to Ignite Reading Achievement”: Deputy Superintendent Michael Cormack

March 11, 2026 • Public Impact

0:00 | 25:19

At Jackson Public Schools in Mississippi, Deputy Superintendent Michael Cormack brought big changes to student outcomes—no surprise after his leadership of the Barksdale Reading Institute, which sparked the state’s stunning literacy turnaround. Under Cormack, Jackson’s state accountability rating went from an F to a C, and he kicked off an initiative to boost the percentage of third graders who passed the state assessment on the first try from 55 to 75%.

In 2025, to strengthen the district’s literacy efforts, he introduced the combination of Opportunity Culture? teaching teams and a focus on high-quality instructional materials. Starting in five elementary schools—to be expanded to all 22 elementary schools in 2026–27—in pre-K through second grade, with a focus on literacy, the district worked with Public Impact?, which founded the Opportunity Culture? initiative, and Leading Educators, which provided literacy curriculum, coaching, and development for teachers.

We caught up with him just before he started his new job as CEO of KIPP Atlanta Schools, to get his reflections on the early difference this work is making in Jackson and thoughts for the future.

"The third-grade reading achievement issue doesn’t begin in third grade. As you all know, it begins much, much sooner. And so we really wanted to start with our focus in pre-kindergarten through second grade, to shore up our foundational skills program and to leverage teaching teams as a vehicle to do that in these five pilot elementary schools.

“I think what’s really exciting is that we get an opportunity to take some of our strongest early educators and give them a platform for elevating their practice while also helping to support their colleagues. And so our Multi-Classroom Leaders are doing really dynamic work with colleagues to make certain that everyone understands the science of reading and has the practical tools within the curriculum to implement those practices effectively.”

—Dr. Michael Cormack

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