A New Year

We hope all our readers enjoyed relaxing holidays and have returned refreshed for the new year. While our family and professional lives continue to make it difficult to blog with great frequency, we hope you'll continue to read our infrequent commentary and join in the discussion during 2011.

A few thoughts to start the new year...

(1) Outcomes First? If outcomes are what really matter in education, it is interesting that so many advocates, commentators and policy organizations seem to count adoption of favored policy reforms as ends in themselves. We are all guilty of this to some degree. It is only when there is a research base to suggest that specific reforms and programs work that there is a strong argument to be made. Examples might include targeted class size reduction in grades k-3, high-quality early childhood education, and comprehensive, multi-year induction support for new teachers. But, at a macro level, certain arguments fall apart when there is no evidence to back them up, such as teachers' unions being a wart on the ass of progress. Take Massachusetts, for example, a strong union state. It leads the nation in TIMMS scores in spite of the fact that the Massachusetts Teachers Association looms large in state politics.

(2) Teachers, Teachers: One of the best developments of 2010 was an increased focus on teachers and on teacher effectiveness in particular. This focus was not always for the better, as in the case of the Los Angeles Times' decision to publish value-added scores for individual teachers or the misleading, union-bashing documentary Waiting For Superman. But an overall focus on the outcomes of teaching is the right policy conversation to be having. However, that conversation must lead to solutions that create comprehensive structures and systems to maximize benefits for all involved -- students, teachers, parents, etc. Regular feedback about teaching is critical for educators, not just summative data or annual evaluations that don't provide actionable feedback. A key goal around improving teacher effectiveness should be the development of schools and districts as communities of practice that make teaching more of a collective endeavor and support all educators to strengthen their individual practices and skills.

(3) ESEA: I am increasingly of the mind that something -- but not much of anything -- will happen with regard to reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act in 2011. If successful, reauthorization will primarily serve as a token of bipartisanship that both parties can carry into the 2012 elections to say "we can work together to get things done." If accomplished, it may be one of the few significant bipartisan accomplishments of this Congress. Look for substantive tweaks to the No Child Left Behind Act rather than a wholesale overhaul of it. More flexibility around AYP. Attention to the needs of rural districts. More local control. Perhaps a stronger focus on teacher performance pay, charter schools and school choice options -- some elements of the Obama Blueprint combined with priority issues for Republicans like John Kline and Lamar Alexander. And level funding, at best.

(4) Exclusivity: One of my wishes for the New Year is that the DC echo chamber would become less and less influential in conversations about education policy. I am constantly amazed at how regularly the usual suspects parrot, squawk about and retweet the comments and ideas of the other usual suspects, especially those with whom they have personal or proprietary relationships. And how the same usual suspects are quoted saying the same usual things by the mainstream and educational media. This dynamic plays out, too, in conversations within multiple exclusive fiefdoms within education that generally have little to no intersection with fiefdoms with competing worldviews or different policy priorities. As someone who once worked in DC and who now works for a non-DC-based national non-profit organization that has relationships with all sides of the education community, I am especially cognizant of this dynamic in which voices outside of the Beltway 'influentials' are not heard.

One alternative stream recently profiled by Rick Hess and Jay Greene are academics doing policy-relevant research and cutting a high profile in policy conversations. We need more of that type of intellect in play -- and not just from economists. Another is the rise of state-based reform groups like Stand for Children, the PIE Network, Delaware's Rodel Foundation and Oregon's Chalkboard Project. Finally, the voice of actual teachers is too often missing from policy conversations. Fortunately, there are numerous efforts afoot to remedy this. Two, in particular, worth checking out are Teach PLUS and the VIVA Project. My organization, the New Teacher Center, in conjunction with the College Board, recently profiled real-life teachers in a publication about the importance of teacher mentoring.

One way or another, 2011 undoubtedly will be an interesting year for education.

Misleading Manifesto

I'm sorry, but the "manifesto" published in today's Washington Post really pisses me off because it is built upon a false premise. It is authored by a number of urban school superintendents, including Chicago's Ron Huberman, New York City's Joel Klein, Washington DC's Michelle Rhee, and New Orleans' Paul Vallas. And it -- intentionally? -- misstates educational research.

"[T]he single most important factor determining whether students succeed in school is not the color of their skin or their ZIP code or even their parents' income -- it is the quality of their teacher."

No. That is patently false.

Now, listen here. I work for a teacher-focused, non-profit organization, the New Teacher Center (NTC). Wouldn't it be powerful to go out and say that teachers matter more than ANYTHING else? But they don't. In terms of school-based variables, they do. But in terms of all variables that impact students, they simply do not. No research says that. In our messaging at the NTC, we are always careful to say that teacher quality is the most important school-based variable for student achievement (examples here and here (on page 4)). That's accurate, honest and powerful in its own right.

So why not make the case for improving teaching in a honest fashion? There is an incredibly strong case to make that improving teaching quality is a critically important and policy amenable part of the solution to increasing student achievement and closing achievement gaps for disadvantaged students. But it's only part of the answer which requires solutions beyond the educational system. Let's not lose sight of that.

At the Shanker Blog, Matthew Di Carlo explored this same issue last month and took journalists to task for making similar claims. Back in July, he summarized existing teacher quality research.

September 16, 2010:

The same body of evidence that shows that teachers are the most important within-school factor influencing test score gains also demonstrates that non-school factors matter a great deal more. [emphasis added] The first wave of high-profile articles in our newly-energized education debate not only seem to be failing to provide this context, but are ignoring it completely. Deliberately or not, they are publishing incorrect information dressed up as empirical fact, spreading it throughout a mass audience new to the topic, to the detriment of us all.

Even though the 10-15 percent explained by teachers still represents a great deal of power (and is among the only factors “within the jurisdiction” of education policy), it is nevertheless important to bear in mind that poor educational outcomes are a result of a complicated web of social and economic forces. [emphasis added] People have to understand that, or they will maintain unrealistic expectations about the extent to which teacher-related policies alone can solve our problems, and how quickly they will work.

July 14, 2010:

But in the big picture, roughly 60 percent of achievement outcomes is explained by student and family background characteristics (most are unobserved, but likely pertain to income/poverty). [emphasis added] Observable and unobservable schooling factors explain roughly 20 percent, most of this (10-15 percent) being teacher effects. The rest of the variation (about 20 percent) is unexplained (error). In other words, though precise estimates vary, the preponderance of evidence shows that achievement differences between students are overwhelmingly attributable to factors outside of schools and classrooms (see Hanushek et al. 1998; Rockoff 2003; Goldhaber et al. 1999; Rowan et al. 2002; Nye et al. 2004).

Let's take Di Carlo's and Joe Friday's advice. Just the facts, please.

Positive Effects of Comprehensive Teacher Induction

Today, Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. released the final report of its IES/U.S Department of Education-funded randomized controlled trial (RCT) of comprehensive teacher induction. It shows a statistically significant and sizeable impact on student achievement in mathematics (0.20 standard deviations) and reading (0.11 standard deviations) of third-year teachers who received two years of robust induction support. That's the equivalent of moving students from the 50th to 54th percentile in reading achievement and from the 50th to 58th percentile in math achievement.

As a basis of comparison, I note that in 2004, Mathematica conducted a RCT of Teach for America (TFA). In that study, it compared the gains in reading and math achievement made by students randomly assigned to TFA teachers or other teachers in the same school. The results showed that, on average, students with TFA teachers raised their mathematics test scores by 0.15 standard deviations (versus 0.20 standard deviations in the induction study), but found no impact on reading test scores (versus 0.11 standard deviations in the induction study).

In another recent Mathematica report (boy, these folks are busy!), the authors note that "The achievement effects of class-size reduction are often used as a benchmark for other educational interventions. After three years of treatment (grades K-2) in classes one-third smaller than typical, average student gains amounted to 0.20 standard deviations in math and 0.23 standard deviations in reading (U.S. Department of Education, 1998)." In that report -- an evaluation of the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), Mathematica researchers found a very powerful impact from KIPP: "For the vast majority of KIPP schools studied, impacts on students’ state assessment scores in mathematics and reading are positive, statistically significant, and educationally substantial.... By year three, half of the KIPP schools in our sample are producing math impacts of 0.48 standard deviations or more, equivalent to the effect of moving a student from the 30th percentile to the 48th percentile on a typical test distribution..... Half of the KIPP schools in our sample show three-year reading effects of 0.28 standard deviations or more."

Is it appropriate to compare effect sizes among RCTs or, for that matter, among research in general? I am told that it is, although certainly considerations such as cost effectiveness and scalability have to enter into the conversation. Implementation issues also must be attended to. With regard to teacher induction, the issue of cost effectiveness was addressed in a 2007 cost-benefit study published in the Education Research Service's Spectrum journal and summarized in this New Teacher Center (NTC) policy brief.

Disclosure: I am employed by the NTC which participated in the induction RCT, and I helped to coordinate NTC's statement on the study.

The NTC is "encouraged" by the study. However, NTC believes that "it does not reflect the even more significant outcomes that can be achieved when districts have the time, capacity and willingness to focus on an in-depth, universal implementation of comprehensive, high-quality induction. It speaks volumes about the quality of induction and mentoring provided and the necessity of new teacher support that student achievement gains were documented despite [design and implementation] limitations to the study."

UPDATE: Read the Education Week story by Stephen Sawchuk here. And the Mathematica press release here.

ESEA Hearing on Teachers and Leaders

The U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions is holding a hearing this morning on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), currently known as No Child Left Behind. Today's hearing focuses on the teacher and school leader elements of ESEA.

Among the witnesses are:

• Randi Weingarten, President, American Federation of Teachers
• Stephanie Hirsch, Executive Director, National Staff Development Council
  
• Jon Schnur, CEO, New Leaders for New Schools
  
• Ellen Moir, CEO, New Teacher Center
  
• Timothy Daly, President, The New Teacher Project
• Thomas Kane, Professor of Education and Economics, Harvard University and Deputy Director, U.S. Education, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
  

UPDATES:
A video replay of the hearing -- as well as links to the participants' testimony -- is available here.

Teaching and Learning Conditions

I'm catching up on education news and blogging after some well-spent time with our family in New York and Vermont last week....

Both successful Phase One Race to the Top (RttT) states -- Delaware and Tennessee -- plan to conduct a statewide teacher working conditions survey. Was this the secret to each state's victory? Well, not exactly, as the states of Colorado, Kentucky, Massachusetts, North Carolina and Ohio also built such a survey into their applications. Of course, each of those states were among the 16 Phase One semifinalists. So, maybe there is something there.

Independent of RttT, however, such efforts are in line with President Obama’s recent Blueprint for Reform: The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which would require states and districts to collect and report teacher survey data on available professional support and working conditions in schools biennially.

Research has demonstrated a connection between positive teaching and learning conditions, teacher retention, and student achievement.

• “There is good evidence to show that teachers’ working conditions matter because they have a direct effect on teachers’ thoughts and feelings—their sense of individual professional efficacy, of collective professional efficacy, of job satisfaction; their organizational commitment, levels of stress and burnout, morale, engagement in the school or profession and their pedagogical content knowledge. These internal states are an important factor in what teachers do and have a direct effect in what happens in the classroom, how well students achieve, and their experience of school.” (Leithwood, 2006)
  
• “Working conditions emerge as highly predictive of teachers’ stated intentions to remain or leave their schools, with leadership emerging as the most salient dimension. Teachers’ perceptions of their working conditions are also predictive of one-year actual departure rates and student achievement, but the predictive power is far lower…Taken together, the working conditions variables account for 10 to 15 percent of the explained variation in math and reading scores across schools, after controlling for individual and school level characteristics of schools.” (Ladd, 2009)
• “[O]ur analysis of teacher mobility showed that salary affects mobility patterns less than do working conditions such as facilities, safety and quality of leadership.” (Hanushek and Rivkin, 2007)
• “…working conditions factors, especially principal support, had more influence on simulated job choice than pay level, implying that money might be better spent to attract, retain or train better principals than to provide higher beginning salaries to teachers in schools with high-poverty or a high proportion of students of color.” (Milanowski et al., 2009)
• A survey of 2,000 educators from California found that 28 percent of teachers who left the profession before retirement indicated that they would come back if improvements were made to teaching and learning conditions. (Futernick, 2007)

Last week's press release from the New Teacher Center goes into greater detail:

“Research has shown that understanding and improving teaching and learning conditions results in increased student success, improved teacher efficacy and motivation, higher teacher retention, and better recruitment strategies that bring educators to hard-to-staff schools,” said Ellen Moir, Chief Executive Officer of the New Teacher Center. “In the past, policymakers have not had the data necessary they need to address educators’ working conditions. Our surveys change this by putting valuable information in the hands of people who make important decisions every day that impact our schools and all those who work and learn in them.”

The New Teacher Center (NTC) assists states and school districts in administering the anonymous, web-based Teaching and Learning Conditions Survey. The NTC has a proven track record of successful administration of teaching and learning conditions surveys in 15 states. In addition to working with state stakeholders to design a customized survey, NTC provides analyses and training materials to help all stakeholders understand and use the Teaching and Learning Conditions Survey results for school improvement.

The Teaching & Learning Conditions Survey has the longest history in North Carolina where policymakers at different levels have utilized Survey data in different ways. Local education leaders have used results at the district level to further bond initiatives. At the state level, data was used in rewriting standards for principals and teachers. The Survey initiative has been so expansive that it has supported the creation of additional funding for professional development in low-performing schools. Results also have led to the development of school leadership training which requires administrators to use Survey data in making school-level improvement decisions.

The news article ('Teacher Surveys Aimed at Swaying Policymakers') from Education Week's Stephen Sawchuk provides additional context:

Despite their differing sample sizes and specific questions, the surveys’ findings about what teachers say they need to be successful are remarkably consistent from instrument to instrument. Some of the top findings: Teachers report that the quality of their schools’ leadership, a say in school decisionmaking, and opportunities to work with their peers affect their own capacity as educators.

Live from San Jose

Tomorrow I'll be Twittering from the New Teacher Center's 12th National Symposium in San Jose, California.

Tuesday's agenda features a morning keynote panel on measuring teacher effectiveness. Panelists include Terry Holliday, Kentucky Commissioner of Education; Brad Jupp, Senior Program Advisor, Teacher Effectiveness and Quality, U.S. Department of Education; and Tom Kane, Professor of Education & Economics, Harvard University and Deputy Director for Education, Gates Foundation. It is moderated by my intrepid NTC colleague, Eric Hirsch.

Today, keynoters include Linda Darling-Hammond and Richard Rothstein, but my schedule likely won't allow me to have my thumbs affixed to my phone or laptop during their presentations.

To follow me, here is the link to my Twitter account.

Race To The Top: Under The Hood

My colleagues and I at the New Teacher Center submitted revised language during the public comment period to strengthen proposed Race to the Top (RttT) regulations. (8/28/2009: "RttT: Redefining Teacher Effectiveness".) I am delighted that most of our suggestions were adopted. Specifically, three changes I am pleased to see in the final RttT regulations and state application released by the U.S. Department of Education today are:

(1) A focus on multiple measures in teacher evaluation.

We have defined effective teacher to mean “a teacher whose students achieve acceptable rates (e.g., at least one grade level in an academic year) of student growth (as defined in this notice). States, LEAs, or schools must include multiple measures, provided that teacher effectiveness is evaluated, in significant part, by student growth (as defined in this notice). Supplemental measures may include, for example, multiple observation-based assessments of teacher performance.”

We have revised criterion (D)(2)(ii) to read, “Design and implement rigorous, transparent, and fair evaluation systems for teachers and principals that (a) differentiate effectiveness using multiple rating categories that take into account data on student growth (as defined in this notice) as a significant factor, and (b) are designed and developed with teacher and principal involvement.”

(2) A stronger focus on school leaders and the inclusion of positive teaching and learning conditions in the definition of effective principal.

We have changed the definition of effective principal as follows: (a) replaced “States may supplement this definition as they see fit” with “States, LEAs, or schools must include multiple measures;” (b) added ”Supplemental measures may include, for example, high school graduation rates and college enrollment rates, as well as evidence of providing supportive teaching and learning conditions, strong instructional leadership, and positive family and community engagement;” and (c) replaced “so long as principal effectiveness is judged, in significant measure by student growth” with “provided that principal effectiveness is evaluated, in significant part, by student growth.”

(3) Greater attention to the need for high-quality teacher induction, mentoring and professional development.

We agree that induction programs and coaching by accomplished teachers and principals can be important and effective strategies for supporting novice teachers and principals upon their entering the profession. We are revising the criterion to clarify that States’ plans in response to this criterion should provide for coaching and induction programs as supports for teachers and principals. Changes: We have revised criterion (D)(5)(i) to clarify that plans should include providing effective, data-informed “coaching” and “induction.”

We agree that professional development, including mentoring and coaching, are important aspects of teacher effectiveness. For this reason, criterion (D)(2)(iv)(a) focuses on using evaluations to inform decisions regarding developing effective teachers and principals, including by providing relevant coaching, induction support, and/or professional development. Criterion (D)(5) also provides for evaluation of the extent to which a State has a high-quality plan for its participating LEAs to provide effective, data-informed professional development, coaching, induction, and common planning and collaboration time to teachers and principals.

Sources of great analysis on the final RttT regulations here:

• Education Week (Michele McNeil): "Rules Set for $4 Billion 'Race to Top' Contest"
• New York Times (Sam Dillon): "After Criticism, The Administration Is Praised for Final Rules on Education Grants"
  
• Teacher Beat: "Teacher Elements of Final Race to the Top Guidelines"
  
• Eduflack: "Just The Race Facts"
• Eduflack: "The Race Officially Begins ... Now"
• Eduwonk: "Racing To The Top"

Teachers' Voice

An important survey was released this week that captures teachers' perceptions of their professional working environment. The national study of 900 teachers by Public Agenda describes educators as falling into one of three groups: "Disheartened," "Contented," and "Idealists." It also raises some serious policy implications for the placement, retention and longevity of teachers based on teachers' perceptions about working conditions, why they entered the profession, and their opinions about proposed policy reforms.

But as useful as this survey may be in defining these issues at a 30,000-foot level, it does not approach the power and utility of teacher surveys that offer entire populations of educators in individual states and districts the opportunity to share their voice about working conditions, leadership support, resources, opportunities for professional learning, etc. In turn, these anonymous surveys also provide contextualized, customized summary data at the state-, district- and school-level based on the perceptions and opinions of local educators.

Teaching and Learning Conditions surveys have been led by the New Teacher Center in states such as Alabama, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina and West Virginia, and in school districts such as Fairfax County, Virginia. They provide state and district policymakers and educational leaders with powerful data to define issues that need to be addressed in school and districts that have major implications for the quality and effectiveness of teachers and principals.

Read the Public Agenda report, but also think about conducting a Teaching and Learning Conditions survey in your state or school district. What do the teachers where you live and work think?

Superteacher To The Rescue!

Given the recent spate of federally-funded studies showing no effect of a variety of educational innovations and interventions, my predicted answer to the question ('Can Teachers' Talent Translate Elsewhere?') posed in this Houston Chronicle story is "no."

I worry, however, that the basic premise of the federally funded Talent Transfer Initiative is faulty and builds upon the notion of teaching (as reinforced by popular culture) as an individual rather than as a collective pursuit. Can 'superteachers' walk into dysfunctional school cultures and work magic that can result in a quantifiable impact on student learning? Some surely can. (It's too bad we can't clone Jamie Escalante and Frank McCourt, isn't it?) More important to ask is, should we expect them to?

What is more desperately needed than an expensive scheme to redistribute 'superteachers' is a serious attention to teaching and learning conditions. My New Teacher Center colleague, Eric Hirsch, spearheads assessment of school culture and the training of school administrators to more effectively shape it. His and independent research (here and here) has identified that teacher effectiveness is facilitated by a positive school context, including support from leadership, the existence of a collaborative working environment, and time for professional learning.

It doesn't appear that the Talent Transfer Initiative envisions teaching and learning conditions as part of the solution, and that's terribly unfortunate. I wonder if the TTI is even collecting such data to investigate the relationship between these variables and teacher success, or lack thereof? Until we address these contextual issues in low-performing and hard-to-staff schools, we're not going to get the results that we expect and students deserve.

UPDATE (9:35 p.m.) -- Claus von Zastrow offers an excellent blog post on Public School Insights about this study as well.

RttT: Redefining Teacher Effectiveness

My colleagues and I at the New Teacher Center have offered up what I believe to be a balanced and thoughtful series of recommendations to strengthen the teacher and principal effectiveness provisions in the U.S. Department of Education's proposed Race to the Top regulations. You can find the NTC's initial public comments -- submitted on August 21 -- here. And you find an addendum -- filed yesterday -- offering recommendations for specific language additions, here.

Generally, we are supportive of the overall direction of Race to the Top. But we feel that its focus on teacher effectiveness is too narrowly about measuring individual teacher impact at the exclusion of supporting all educators to strengthen their teaching and leadership skills and attending to teaching and learning conditions within schools that impact student success.

Here is a brief summary of our recommendations:

Improving Teacher Effectiveness and Achieving Equity in Teacher Distribution
• The RttT guidelines should include a definition of teacher effectiveness that acknowledges and
supports the development of teacher and principal practice, especially during the early years.
New teachers and principals, who disproportionately work in struggling schools, need strong
mentoring and support to become effective.

• The RttT guidelines should define ‘effective principal’ more expansively, drawing upon
additional measures of student success and data on teaching and learning conditions to fully
reflect the impact of teachers, school leaders, and school environment on student learning.

• The RttT guidelines should require states to address school leadership development and teaching and learning conditions in their strategies to improve teacher effectiveness and the equitable distribution of quality teachers.

Improving Collection and Use of Data
• RttT guidelines should specifically include teaching and learning conditions data gathered from
practitioners to help schools, districts and states better understand supports and barriers to
teacher effectiveness and equitable teacher distribution, and to incorporate this information into
their longitudinal P-20 data systems.

And here is some selected language that provides insight into our thinking around teacher effectiveness and teacher development:

Teacher effectiveness in the proposed RttT guidelines focuses exclusively on value-added student assessments. While value-added student achievement data can be used to reward and recognize certain achievements by educators, it should not be the sole method by which teachers are evaluated, observed, rewarded, and deemed “effective.” Firing the least effective teachers and rewarding the most effective alone is short-sighted and ignores the vast majority of teachers in the middle who can achieve greater success if given access to high-quality induction and professional development, strong and supportive school administrators, and opportunities for collaboration and leadership. Great teachers are made – not born. Teachers need professional support and opportunities to develop their practice, including focused induction during their initial years in the profession. It is important to measure teacher impact on student learning, but measuring impact without providing the means to help educators strengthen their practice will ultimately fail our schools.

If RttT is to be an effective reform strategy, it needs to recognize teacher development as a primary means to maximize classroom effectiveness. RttT should require states not merely to identify the best teachers, but see that their successes form the building blocks of a better understanding of effective teaching practice that can be replicated in classrooms across America.

And on teaching and learning conditions:

In order for school leaders to attract and retain quality teachers, research shows the need for school leaders to make decisions based on data that incorporate the perspective of classroom teachers. Teacher survey data can provide insight into the school culture, how decisions are made, and the use of instructional and planning time for teachers. Such contextual data may explain differences in teacher effectiveness between schools and districts. NTC has worked with over 300,000 educators in 10 states, and collected teaching and learning conditions data from over 8,000 schools to utilize in school improvement plans. In North Carolina, the State Board of Education now requires schools to utilize the data from the biennial working conditions survey to inform annual improvement plans and strategies.

Quality teachers will seek out and stay with strong supportive school leaders; therefore, using RttT funds for salary bonuses in hard-to-staff schools would not be the most effective approach. RttT should encourage states to show how they are using data from teachers, along with student achievement and other relevant data, to develop policies for these schools, strengthen school leadership, and ensure that they are settings where the most effective teachers want to work and can succeed.

The RttT public comment period closes today and a spate of organizations have submitted comments just under the wire. They range from narrow to broad, supportive to critical, and offer everything from research-based suggested line edits to what basically look like press releases buttering up Secretary Duncan.

Visit here to review all of the public comments submitted.

New Teacher Center Annual Symposium

If you are an educational practitioner, policymaker, or researcher with an interest in the needs of new teachers, you may want to consider presenting at the New Teacher Center's annual Symposium on Teacher Induction in San Jose, California in February 7-9, 2010.

In addition to new teacher development and support, the NTC also seeks submissions that address school leadership development, teacher compensation, teacher evaluation, working conditions, and related themes. Submissions should exemplify best practices and current research and present new issues or topics, innovative ways of viewing traditional issues, and/or research that substantiates, promotes, and advances the work of teacher development and induction.

The NTC has released an online call for proposals. For your information, here is an overview of the sessions featured at the 2009 meeting.

New Teacher Center Annual Symposium

If you are an educational practitioner, policymaker, or researcher with an interest in the needs of new teachers, you may want to consider presenting at The New Teacher Center's annual Symposium on Teacher Induction in San Jose, California in February 7-9, 2010.

In addition to new teacher development and support, the NTC also seeks submissions that address school leadership development, teacher policy, working conditions, and related themes. Submissions should exemplify best practices and current research and present new issues or topics, innovative ways of viewing traditional issues, and/or research that substantiates, promotes, and advances the work of teacher development and induction.

The NTC has released an online call for proposals. The deadline is August 10.

The Revolving Door of Teachers In Chicago

The Consortium for Chicago School Research today released an informative study ("The Schools Teachers Leave") of teacher turnover in Chicago Public Schools (CPS). It reviewed the personnel records of approximately 35,000 public school teachers in 538 elementary schools and 118 high schools over a five-year period between the 2002-03 and 2006-07 school years. Its primary finding is that half of all Chicago public school teachers had left their school within four years -- and more than two thirds of new teachers had. It also identified 100 CPS schools with "chronically" high teacher turnover -- losing about a quarter of their teachers annually. While these statistics are slightly worse than Illinois as a state and the nation as a whole, CPS is not a huge outlier with regard to teacher mobility. It is a problem across the board.

From an equity standpoint, teacher mobility and turnover is a particular chllaenge for schools within urban districts like CPS because of the student population they serve. Turnover has significant implications for educational equity because schools with large percentages of African-American and low-income students are more likely to be inflicted with this revolving door of teachers. These students in greatest need of access to quality education and quality teaching are the least likely to receive it. They are more likely be taught by beginning teachers and those without full credentials or relevant subject matter knowledge. This lack of educator quality feeds low student achievement, socioeconomic and racial achievement gaps, and dropout rates.

The Consortium reports offers some guidance about what relatively successful schools look like. It identifies teacher working conditions as a major factor in retention and in developing a nurturing and collaborative professional environment.

The schools that retain their teachers at high rates are those with a strong sense of collaboration among teachers and the principal. Teachers are likely to stay in schools where they view their colleagues as partners with them in the work of improving the whole school. They are likely to leave schools where colleagues are resistant to school-wide initiatives and where teachers’ efforts stop at their own classroom door. Teachers stay in schools with inclusive leadership,
where they feel they have influence over their work environment and they trust their principal as an instructional leader.

Thus, teachers stay in schools where the conditions are well suited for them to have the potential to be effective—where their colleagues are collaborators, school administration is supportive, parents trust teachers to do their jobs, and the learning climate for students is safe and non-disruptive. These elements of school working conditions are among the key elements needed to improve student achievement, along with a school-wide focus on improving instruction.

To address this teacher quality problem, one solution that new CPS CEO Ron Huberman has announced is to expand the new teacher induction and mentoring work of the Chicago New Teacher Center throughout the district. (Disclosure: I work for the New Teacher Center, the CNTC's parent organization.) CNTC is currently active in five CPS Instructional Areas, mostly on Chicago's South Side. Its intensive mentoring work -- and high-quality induction overall -- has been shown not only to increase teacher retention, but also to help beginning teachers become more effective in the classroom. The work of the CNTC was recently profiled in the Center for American Progress report, Ensuring Effective Teachers for All Students.

This kind of data analysis is exactly what all states and school districts should be engaged in. It's hard to fix a problem that isn't understood and it's hard to set a policy goal to address something that isn't quantifiable. More often than not, the reason this type of analysis isn't occurring is due to the lack of political will and the unwillingness to grapple with bad news, rather than the absence of data systems or human talent to conduct it. Where there's a will, there's a way. Without naming names, I've seen a 'can't do' attitude triumph again and again in states and districts. It's best to take this work out of the direct control of politicians and educational leaders who serve systems over kids. Perhaps that's why this effort ("Education Week: Chicago Group Promotes Links for Districts, Researchers") to replicate the Chicago Consortium model is a promising one. And, in this case, kudos to CPS leaders for being open to this scrutiny and their willingness to learn from it.

MORE:
Chicago Tribune coverage
Chicago Sun-Times coverage and editorial
Catalyst Chicago blog

Thoughts on Equitable Teacher Distribution

In a U.S. News & World Report article (“In Urban Classrooms, the Least Experienced Teach the Neediest Kids”), the New America Foundation’s MaryEllen McGuire offers a compelling analysis of the problem of inequitable teacher distribution in American schools.

Why are our least experienced professionals consistently being handed the most challenging teaching assignments? Because of the way seniority is rewarded in teacher contracts. More often that not, union contracts dictate that veteran teachers get first dibs on available positions within a school system. As a result, when given the chance, teachers often choose to transfer to more desirable, low-poverty schools. As a result of these transfers, students with the greatest educational need are time and time again taught by the least experienced teachers.

This is a topic that the Education Optimists have written about previously (see here and here). In addition, The Education Trust has done some good work on this issue, including this 2006 report ("Teaching Inequality: How Poor and Minority Students Are Shortchanged on Teacher Quality") by Kati Haycock and Heather Peske.

But compared to her solid conception of the problem, McGuire somewhat misses the mark on proposed solutions to inequitable teacher distribution. She writes:

This will require a long-term commitment to systemic reform including investing in low-poverty schools to make them more attractive teaching placements and funding incentives to initially attract experienced and, we hope, higher quality teachers to low-income schools. Will this require dollars beyond what we have? Not necessarily. Federal law already provides schools with money to pay for this. It's just that the funds typically go to reduce class sizes or provide professional development for teachers instead - strategies that have mixed results. Some of these funds should be redirected to pay for incentives drawing teachers into high-poverty schools. This is also a great use of stimulus money.

Should some federal Title II dollars be used for recruitment incentives? Sure - but let's not take that idea too far. The distribution problem is one of retention as much as it is one of recruitment. Title II funding should and can be used for high-quality professional development and high-quality induction and mentoring focused on improving teaching practice – efforts directed at making teachers more effective that simultaneously improve retention and self-efficacy. This legislation, sponsored by U.S. Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, would go a long way toward these ends. Arguably, these approaches to teacher development are arguably a far better use of stimulus money than recruitment incentives.

In addition, as the author suggests (“more attractive teaching placements”), we need to work with school leaders and policymakers to improve the working conditions in these hard-to-staff, high-poverty schools and districts. We need to provide educators time to collaborate and a role in school decision-making—things that don't cost a whole lot of money but that do require a new way of doing business. Research has shown these factors are often more important than often paltry recruitment incentives in keeping the highest-quality, most effective teachers at hard-to-staff schools.

Teacher Preparation: Mend It, Don't End It

Some education reformers want to cut higher education out of the business of teacher preparation and give the job to non-traditional providers. While there are numerous alternatives to traditional teacher preparation--such as residency programs and initiatives such as Teach for America--the vast majority of the nation's teachers continue to graduate from schools of education.

I recently authored this policy brief, funded by the Carnegie Corporation through a grant to my employer, the New Teacher Center, as part of its Teacher for a New Era (TNE) initiative. TNE is built upon the premise that teacher preparation can be strengthened by building upon strong teacher development partnerships that currently exist between higher education and k-12 schools. The brief makes the case that teacher development should not assumed to be over the day a teacher leaves his or her preparation program, but should be viewed as a developmental continuum spanning the entire teaching career which should include a robust induction period. It offers up some promising partnership models and example of state policies that support the development of such linkages between teacher education and school-based induction programs.

Here's are some brief excerpts:

The Carnegie Corporation’s Teachers for a New Era (TNE) initiative is an attempt to rethink teaching by building upon what works, focusing on available evidence to improve, and learning from successful reform models. In effect, it is an opportunity and a call for traditional teacher preparation to reinvent itself.

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A challenge for practitioners and policymakers alike is to envision and create a continuum of teacher support which stretches from the first days of pre-service education throughout the entire teaching career. The critical element of this challenge is to strengthen the connection between the pre-service curriculum and district-based teacher induction program and to develop mutual accountability for new teacher development among the key stakeholders. The reality is far from this vision.

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The alignment of teacher preparation and induction has been a focus of conversation among academics, practitioners, and policymakers for more than two decades. Calls continue to come from many quarters for greater action on this front. Most recently, James G. Cibulka, president of the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education, has vowed to use the organization as a “lever for reform,” urging institutions of higher education to build intensive partnerships with schools and districts.

Only in a select few settings have imagined reforms actually occurred. An on-going challenge is to continue to move this work forward and to create replicable partnership models and policies. Another challenge is actually demonstrating the impact of such work—not just for teachers, but also for their students and the schools they serve. Advocates of such a system, including the Carnegie Corporation’s Teachers for a New Era initiative, have made a compelling case that an aligned system of teacher development is in the best interest of the educators themselves. But does it result in more effective teachers? And does it benefit students and schools? Perhaps it does, but we don’t really have sufficient evidence to demonstrate it.

Due to the rarity of data systems that bridge the divide between higher education and k–12 schools, it has been nearly impossible to measure the impact of the small number of partnerships and state policies that have sought to create a seamless teacher development continuum encompassing both pre-service education and new teacher induction. Theoretically, if the alignment is strong, then we should see a number of outcomes as a result: greater teacher satisfaction, increased educator self-efficacy, reduced new teacher attrition, stronger teacher evaluation data, and perhaps even improved student achievement.

Stand For Children

Child advocacy groups are pretty predictable creatures. They're all about childhood immunization, child health care, and early childhood education, right? Well, usually.

Not these folks.

Stand for Children is a national 501(c)(3) based in Portland, Oregon. It is a self-proclaimed "citizen voice for children" that torpedoes the traditional concept of what a child advocacy group is and can do. Stand "builds effective local and statewide networks of grassroots advocates" and focuses on "securing adequate funding for public schools and reforming education policies and practices to help children thrive academically, giving them the opportunities they need to become successful, productive citizens."

Stand has taken on an aggressive reform agenda focused on k-12 education and teacher quality, specifically. Stand was instrumental -- along with the Chalkboard Project -- in passing a visionary teacher mentoring law (HB2574) in the state of Oregon in 2007. (For more, read an article by Stand's Dana Hepper on page 7 of the New Teacher Center's Reflections newsletter.) They've achieved many other successes, too.

Stand has state affiliates in Massachusetts, Oregon, Tennessee and Washington state -- and soon in Colorado as well. It is led by Jonah Edelman, co-founder and executive director.

Check them out.

Duncan's Team

Linda Darling-Hammond may not be joining Team Duncan at the U.S. Department of Education (TWIE/Politics K-12), but Jo Anderson is -- as a senior advisor to the Secretary.

Who is Jo, you ask? Well, folks in Illinois know him very well as the executive director of the Illinois Education Association, a post he's held since 2005. I've gotten to work closely with him over the past three years through the New Teacher Center's work on a statewide teacher induction policy committee in the Land of Lincoln.

Jo is a dynamic presence and a thoughtful advocate for public education. He's also the type of guy who is not afraid to roll up his sleeves and get his hands dirty. He won't let Washington or a big title at the USDoE go to his head. In addition, Jo sees the big picture as well as understanding that policy details matter. He'll serve Secretary Duncan well.

Plus, he's a fellow Boston College grad. Go Eagles!

Here's a brief bio on Jo for those of you who want to know more about him:

Jo Anderson Jr.
In November of 2005, Jo Anderson Jr. was named executive director of the Illinois Education Association. IEA is an association of 120,000 members composed of Illinois elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty and staff, educational support professionals, retired educators, and college students preparing to become teachers.

Prior to becoming executive director of the IEA, Anderson was director for the IEA-NEA Center for Educational Innovation, a center created to facilitate school restructuring and reform efforts throughout Illinois. The center serves as a catalyst for positive changes in education and provides Illinois Education Association locals with the resources, expertise, and motivation to experiment with school restructuring.

Anderson has facilitated collaborative negotiations in over 60 situations in Illinois and other parts of the country. He has extensive experience in innovative negotiating processes such as win-win and interest-based bargaining. He is also a founder and facilitator of the Consortium for Educational Change (CEC), a network of 50 school districts throughout the Chicago suburbs that are working collaboratively to restructure and improve their schools. He has presented an array of training programs and workshops in Illinois and other parts of the country in the areas of collaborative labor-management relationships, professional unionism, and educational change.

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UPDATE -- March 12, 2009 -- Three weeks later, here is Secretary Duncan's official announcement of Jo Anderson Jr.'s appointment. And here is reaction from Teacher Beat.

Do You Know The Way To San Jose?

Who says there's nothing to do in February?

Come on out to San Jose, California for the New Teacher Center's Annual Symposium on February 2-3, 2009 to learn all you ever wanted to know about supporting our newest educators. I promise you a fun and informative time - and if you bring this blog post with you and join us to watch the Super Bowl on the big screens in the Fairmont lobby, the beer is on me.

Early registration ends on Friday, January 9!

New Teacher Center Annual Symposium

If you're an educational practitioner, policymaker or researcher interested in supporting new educators, have I got the perfect conference for you! It's the 11th New Teacher Center Symposium on New Teacher Induction. It takes place in San Jose, California from February 2-3, 2009, with pre-conference sessions on (Super Bowl) Sunday, February 1.

The conference includes three themes central to induction: (1) Quality Mentoring, (2) Leadership and Professional Identity, and (3) Equity and Social Justice. Numerous conference presentations will be offered by NTC staff as well as representatives of state government, foreign governments, universities, school districts, teacher unions, and policy/research organizations.

The keynote speaker is Andy Hargreaves, the Thomas More Brennan Chair in Education at the Lynch School of Education at Boston College (my alma mater). Other guest speakers include NTC executive director Ellen Moir, Monica Martinez of the KnowledgeWorks Foundation, and Joe McDonald, professor at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University and director of the NYC Partnership for Teacher Excellence. Even yours truly will be involved in three sessions, focused on state induction policy, advocating for investments in high-quality new teacher support, and a focus group for policymakers in attendance.

For more information or to register, please visit here.

...And It's Sarah Palin! Who?!?!

Word just leaked that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin (NGA bio) has been tapped by John McCain to be his vice presidential running mate. Certainly his choice is not an attempt to nail down Alaska's vote in the Electoral College. It is an obvious attempt to appeal to independent women voters (and any Clinton supporters Obama didn't win over at the Democratic Convention) and to counter Obama's youth and dynamism. How Palin will face up to Joe Biden in the VP debate is another question.

Here is an initial look into Palin's education record in a year-and-a-half as Alaska Governor.

(1) In her 2008 State of the State Address she had this to say:

Victor Hugo said, “He who opens a school door, closes a prison.” It's a privileged obligation we have to “open education doors.” ... Stepping through “the door” is about more than passing a standardized test. We need kids prepared to pass life's tests – like getting a job and valuing a strong work ethic. Our Three-year Education Plan invests more than a billion dollars each year. We must forward-fund education, letting schools plan ahead. We must stop pink-slipping teachers, and then struggle to recruit and retain them the next year.

We will enable schools to finally focus on innovation and accountability to see superior results. We're asking lawmakers to pass a new K-12 funding plan early this year. This is a significant investment that is needed to increase the base student allocation, district cost factors and intensive needs students. It includes $100 million in school construction and deferred maintenance. There is awesome potential to improve education, respect good teachers, and embrace choice for parents. This potential will prime Alaska to compete in a global economy that is so competitive it will blow us away if we are not prepared. Beyond high school, we will boost job training and University options. We are proposing more than $10 million in new funding for apprenticeship programs, expansion of construction, engineering and health care degrees to meet demands. But it must be about more than funds, it must be a change in philosophy. It is time to shift focus, from just dollars and cents to “caliyulriit,” which is Yupik for “people who want to work.” Work for pride in supporting our families, in and out of the home. Work for purpose and for action, and ultimately destiny fulfilled by being fruitful. It's about results and getting kids excited about their future – whether it is college, trade school or military.

(2) In her 2006 gubernatorial campaign, her education platform included:

A. Schools of Choice
B. Expanded Vocational Training Opportunities
C. Pre-Kindergarten
D. Competitive Teacher Salaries & Benefits

(3) Palin has been a strong supporter of the Alaska Statewide Mentor Project. The Alaska Department of Education & Early Development created the Project in partnership with the University of Alaska in support of their shared mission to improve academic achievement for students in Alaska. Through mentoring for beginning teachers, the goals of the program are to increase teacher retention and increase student achievement. The model is adapted from the New Teacher Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Prior to being elected Governor in 2006, Palin had served four years on a city council and six years as a mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, a city of 6,000 people.