Education News in Alabama for April 23, 2010
- Focusing on teacher effectiveness will yield results;
- RESEARCH: 4 Ways to Empower Effective Teachers;
- Superintendents’ Leaders Network Deadline;
- SCHOOL BOARD: Educator Effectiveness, Innovation School Systems;
- Ala. Already Moving on Teaching’s Future;
- Reaching Students’ Untapped Potential.
Focusing on Teacher Effectiveness Will Yield Results
“Improving the quality of education in Alabama requires a comprehensive strategy to ensure that every Alabama student is taught by an effective teacher,” wrote Caroline Novak in the Montgomery Advertiser.
“At every step along the way, decisions must be designed to give children the effective teachers they deserve,” she wrote, including:
* who goes into teaching;
* how teachers are prepared;
* how job performance is evaluated;
* professional development to strengthen performance;
* dismissal.
RESEARCH FINDING:
4 Ways to Empower Effective Teachers
A teacher’s effectiveness has more impact on student learning than any other factor under the control of school systems – including class size, school size, and the quality of after-school programs.
This issue brief from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation identifies 4 key ways to empower effective teachers:
- Develop shared leadership, vision and commitment to action;
- Make data-driven decisions;
- Engage stakeholders;
- Implement policies that support – or at least don’t restrict – improvement efforts.
Get the report: Empowering Effective Teachers: Readiness for Reform
Superintendents’ Leaders Network deadline April 30
Applications for the 2nd class of the Superintendents’ Leaders Network are due by 4/30. SLN is a collaboration of the School Superintendents of Alabama and the A+ Best Practices Center. Questions? Email [email protected]
STATE SCHOOL BOARD HIGHLIGHTS:
Educator Effectiveness, Innovation School Systems
The board was briefed on proposals to:
- Appoint a committee to develop definitions and measurements of teacher and principal effectiveness. (Download info on proposed resolution)
- Create Innovation School Systems with freedom from certain restrictions in exchange for greater accountability. (Download info on proposed resolution)
The state board of education met in a work session on April 22. All were present except Stephanie Bell and the governor.
FROM THE A+ BLOG:
Ala. already moving on teaching’s future
The ideas in “The Teachers of 2030” are daring and provocative – as writing about the future tends to be. But what is most interesting about the monograph—from an Alabama perspective—is that your state has already laid the groundwork for hybrid teaching roles similar to those described in Berry’s forward-looking work.
Reaching students’ untapped potential
There are 5,700 Alabama teenagers who owe a debt of gratitude to Jaime Escalante, the charismatic California math teacher who was the subject of the 1988 movie “Stand and Deliver.” Though he never taught here, his spirit of high expectations for all students already pervades A+ College Ready’s 23 program high schools scattered across the state.
