In this episode of Carpool Talk, Miranda Stovall and Georgia teacher Vince Boley continue our Sold a Story series with Episodes 8, 11 & 12. We look at how the podcast sparked real policy change across the country, including new literacy legislation and growing momentum behind “science of reading”–aligned instruction, while also surfacing the limits of top-down reform.

We then head into Steubenville, Ohio, a high-poverty district outperforming national peers, to examine what sustained success actually looks like in practice—from early language development and structured reading blocks to intensive tutoring and long-term consistency. Finally, we turn to the research behind Success for All and the work of Nancy Madden and Bob Slavin, unpacking what the evidence says about early literacy intervention and long-term student outcomes.

Across these episodes, we wrestle with a central question: what does it really mean for reading instruction to be “evidence-based,” and how do we move from policy momentum to lasting classroom impact?