Teaching quality impacts classroom instruction. Teaching is difficult, demanding and draining work; teaching in urban environs exacerbates the difficulties, the demands and the complexities of teaching. Through the eyes of an assistant superintendent, charged with implementing a new vision for literacy teaching and learning, this manuscript describes an intervention study conducted in a large, Southern urban district in the USA, designed to build upon and expand teacher knowledge initially acquired through teacher education. The intervention was designed to increase efficacy in an effort to halt the decline of student outcomes by standardizing literacy teaching across kindergarten through third grade. (Contains 1 figure and 5 tables.)