Ten years ago, education leaders, policy makers, and philanthropists caught on to what parents already knew: In a school, teachers are the most important factor determining whether a student succeeds in the classroom. A decade ago, the Joyce Foundation decided to fund research and advocacy on the importance of placing a highly effective teacher in each classroom, the best ways to identify and reward excellent teachers, and ways to support those who need additional help improving their work.
As momentum built and research made the case for reform, school districts across the country began to reexamine the role and importance of our nation’s educators.
Coinciding with The Joyce Foundation’s ten-year focus on teacher quality, the foundation commissioned Bellwether Education Partners to produce Genuine Progress, Great Challenges: A Decade of Teacher Effectiveness Reforms, a report that documents how the teacher quality movement took hold and propelled policy changes in dozens of states. The report also highlights key findings, best practices and case studies from a decade’s worth of research and action. And it details the work that lies ahead.
Here are the 5 key recommendations to policymakers that the report elaborates upon:
• You can’t people-proof systems in education. Current evaluation systems are a substantial improvement over previous policies. But are these the tools that will create a genuinely professional ethos for teachers? Evaluation systems should complement metric-driven systems with true managerial discretion. Districts should train and support managers and hold them accountable for their professional decisions.
• Professionalize professional development. The existing body of literature on professional development is extremely limited, but teachers must be supported in their work. Policymakers should identify and promote professional development that improves educator practice and student achievement. Evaluations should align with professional development for the purposes of growth and improvement, not just performance management.
• Open and expand teacher preparation. Teacher preparation is a difficult sector to reform, but doing so is key to improving teacher quality overall. Policymakers should increase rigor and quality in teacher preparation but also end protectionism of traditional preparation programs and open preparation to greater competition.
• Address productivity. Current education policy is often additive rather than productivity focused. Policymakers should find ways to promote productivity by better deploying the existing pool of teacher talent or improving how technology is used in schools and classrooms.
• Address the politics. Education is inherently political and the American debate about public education is special interest dominated. School improvement requires a robust political strategy to support its educational strategy.
It is comforting to see that a research report ten years in the making confirms many of the initiatives being championed by education reformers.
For more information, please visit: http://www.joycefdn.org/assets/1/7/JOYCE_Teacher_Effectiveness_web_%281%29.pdf
