The articles in this booklet address the questions raised by the Maine Learning Consortium in its efforts to look closely at, describe, and assess the use of programs such as the Exemplary Center for Reading Instruction (ECRI). Based on interviews with six teachers, the first article examines student achievement gains through the use of ECRI. Student textbook placement as one indicator of increased achievement is addressed in the second article, which compares reading placement by grade level in the fall of 1976 (before the use of ECRI) and in the fall of 1980 (after the use of ECRI). The third article describes changes in several achievement subtest scores for students in one school. The analysis of the effect of ECRI instruction on student performance in one Maine school district presented in the fourth article includes several sets of information from different sources to be used by the board of directors as they review programs. The fifth article describes a district-wide program evaluation process that evolved from questions originally raised from the community. The final article describes the Consortium's assessment of changes in teacher's level of use of ECRI based on self-reports from more than 350 teachers over 3 years. (HOD)