# Active Reading for Intake and Triage (Self-Paced)

Canonical URL: <https://www.graduateschool.edu/courses/active-reading-for-intake-and-triage>

## Overview

This self-paced course is for staff who read, understand, and act on incoming written submissions - allegations, complaints, tips, and requests. You will learn a practical active-reading process, a consistent way to annotate what matters, and a repeatable method for spotting recurring themes across many submissions.

Along the way you will strengthen your reading comprehension, so you understand and retain more of what you read. Then you will put it all together to reach fast, defensible decisions about what happens next - including how to recognize when an issue is serious enough to escalate rather than route as usual. Practice exercises use realistic, sanitized submissions so you can apply each skill right away.

## What you'll learn

- Read work submissions with a purpose-driven active-reading process (survey, question, read, annotate, review)
- Use deep reading and annotation to improve your reading comprehension - understanding and remembering more of what you read
- Decide when to read deeply and when a quick skim or scan is enough
- Annotate what you read with a consistent system that captures facts, themes, risks, and required actions
- Identify and name the recurring themes across a batch of submissions
- Use a routing guide to reach a clear next-step decision - including when to escalate a serious issue and when to handle it through normal routing
- Check your own comprehension with practical self-assessment tools you can keep using on the job

## Curriculum

#### Module 1: How Skilled Readers Actually Read

- Describe how purpose-driven reading differs from passive reading of high-stakes written material.
- Explain why accurate comprehension outweighs raw reading speed in intake and triage work.
- Identify the reading demands unique to allegations, complaints, tips, and requests.
- Recognize the cost of misreading a submission and the value of a deliberate reading process.

#### Module 2: Active Reading in Practice

- Apply a five-step active-reading process—survey, question, read, annotate, and review—to a written submission.
- Determine when to read deeply and when a skim or scan is sufficient for the material at hand.
- Use a quick prioritization pass to sort incoming submissions during triage.
- Practice the process on realistic, sanitized submissions.

#### Module 3: Annotation That Drives Decisions

- Apply a consistent symbol-and-margin annotation system while reading.
- Capture facts, themes, risks, and required actions in a clear, reusable format.
- Produce annotations another reader can follow and act on.
- Use annotations to keep reading organized under high submission volume.

#### Module 4: From Notes to Themes

- Use a lightweight method to turn annotations into a set of recurring themes.
- Name and define themes that appear across a batch of submissions.
- Build a short, defensible list of themes supported by evidence from the text.
- Distinguish a genuine recurring theme from an isolated detail.

#### Module 5: Reading to Route

- Connect active reading and identified themes to a routing guide.
- Reach a clear, defensible next-step decision for a submission.
- Document the rationale that supports a routing or escalation decision.
- Apply routing criteria consistently across submissions.

#### Module 6: Making It Stick

- Use self-assessment tools to check reading comprehension on the job.
- Establish reading habits that sustain accuracy under volume.
- Develop a personal action plan to apply active reading to daily intake and triage work.
- Identify resources and job aids to reinforce the process over time.

## Pricing

**Tuition:** $649