Teacher Leadership Today

Teaching Then and Now

To celebrate the 25th anniversary publication of its widely followed annual teacher poll, the MetLife Foundation compared responses from its most recent survey (2008) with teacher views offered in the survey’s early years.

As Teacher Magazine reports, “For the most part…the trend lines are encouraging, even surprising in some cases. The percentage of teachers saying that they are very satisfied with their careers has increased from 40 in 1984 to 62 in 2008, while more teachers today (66 percent) feel respected by society than did their counterparts in 1984 (47 percent).” [Download a PDF of The MetLife Survey of the American Teacher: Past, Present, and Future]

Other survey findings reported by Teacher's Anthony Rebora:

Perhaps even more provocatively, the percentage of teachers agreeing that they can earn a “decent salary” has nearly doubled since 1984, to 66 percent, and far more teachers today (75 percent, compared to 45 percent in 1984) say they would recommend a career in teaching to a young person.

In addition, two thirds of today’s teachers affirm that they were well-prepared for the profession, compared to 46 percent in 1984. Teachers also feel better equipped today than in past years when it comes to addressing student-learning challenges such as poverty, limited English language proficiency, and lack of parental support, according to the report.

The number of teachers who rate the academic standards in their school as excellent, meanwhile, has doubled from 26 percent in 1984 to 53 percent today, and 89 percent of teachers say their school’s curriculum is excellent or good, compared to 81 percent in 1984.

Not all the news was good. Some longstanding challenges have increased. Today, half (49%) of teachers say that poverty hinders learning for at least a quarter of their students, compared to 41% in 1992. More teachers (43%) agree that their classes have become so mixed in terms of students’ learning abilities that they can’t teach effectively, compared to 39% in 1988. The survey also found that few teachers (perhaps 25%) are making regular use of the Internet’s interactive potential in their teaching or their own professional development, a finding explored by TLN blogger Bill Ferriter in a February 25 post.

So what do you think? Do these results match your own reality?

Building with Straw

Wikipedia has a succinct definition of "straw man" --

A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position. To "set up a straw man," one describes a position that superficially resembles an opponent's actual view, yet is easier to refute. Then, one attributes that position to the opponent. For example, someone might deliberately overstate the opponent's position. While a straw man argument may work as a rhetorical technique—and succeed in persuading people—it carries little or no real evidential weight, since the opponent's actual argument has not been refuted.

In my view, this describes to a "T" the recent attacks on Stanford professor Linda Darling-Hammond by Kathleen Madigan of the Pioneer Institute and her allies, over many months now, to the detriment of any united action among education reform-minded Democrats who need to find more common ground around their shared commitment to assure quality schools for high-needs students. Darling-Hammond, who led President Obama's transition team for education prior to the Inauguration, has (probably wisely) decided to withdraw from the fray and return to her work at Stanford.

In a effort not to add to the heap of straw bales already crowding the reform field , I'll leave it to readers to peruse the following selection of posts and decide for themselves whether Darling-Hammond has been used to divide Democrats and isolate those who disagree with the political positions represented by Madigan and others. A useful guiding question: Whose best interests are in whose hearts?

Kathleen Madigan: A Repackaged Education Proposal (Boston Globe Op-ed, 2/14)
L. Darling-Hammond: Knowledge, Skills Are Not Mutually Exclusive Goals (Boston Globe letter, 2/20)
A Convenient Bogeyman (Public School Insights, 2/20)
Linda Darling-Hammond Gives Props to Core Knowledge (Core Knowledge Blog, 2/20)
Diane Ravitch: In Education, The New Administration Is As Ruinous As The Old (Arena/Politico, 2/21)
The Future of Education Policy, If Darling-Hammond Has Her Way (Gotham Schools, 1/22)
Tom Toch: Darling-Hammond Unbound (The Quick and the Ed, 12/4)

-- john norton

Advice for the Melancholy

Veteran teacher Susan Graham blogs under the “TLN brand” at the Teacher Magazine website, where the editors rarely promote their on-board authors in their Blogboard feature, preferring to give some attention to other teacher-writers on the Web. They made an exception last week, though. Here's what they wrote.

Teacher blogger (and certified night owl) Susan Graham posts a very thoughtful ‘open letter’ to Mildly Melancholy, the young NYC teacher-blogger who - after a wrenching semester - was recently relieved of her position.

The first response to Susan's post came from Mildly Melancholy herself:

Susan, wow, I am blown away. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, for your kind words, encouragement, and empathy. I've been feeling aimless and directionless, trying to reconcile the potential difference between my past and future, desperate for something positive and hopeful. This letter really helped with that. I really appreciate your support. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Susan teaches Family and Consumer Sciences at a Virginia middle school. An NBCT with nearly 30 years experience, she often has wise things to say about policy and practice from her Place at the Table.

Stimulating Teacher Dialogue

In a six-part blog series at Public School Insights, two teacher leaders are offering their insider perspectives on the Recession of 2008-09 and its public school impacts. Anthony Cody and Ken Bernstein, both members of the Teacher Leaders Network Forum, began their posts last Wednesday, just as Senate leaders and President Obama announced a stimulus package agreement.

In updates posted yesterday and today, Bernstein and Cody react to the final stimulus bill and invite other educators to share their own reactions and their stories regarding the consequences of economic chaos on the students and teachers in their own school systems.

Bernstein, a high school teacher in Maryland, blogs regularly at DailyKos as "teacherken." Cody, a middle grades science coach in Oakland CA, writes the blog Living in Dialogue at the Teacher Magazine website.

How Teachers Learn -- and Lead

The February issue of Educational Leadership, How Teachers Learn, features a series of timely articles on professional growth throughout a teaching career, beginning with "From Surviving to Thriving." An article on professional learning communities considers how teachers can move collectively beyond talk into action -- there's even a video! You might want to print out a copy of the article "The Principal's Role in Supporting Learning Communities" (wear gloves if you must to avoid fingerprints).

And the editors don't overlook the leadership dimension of teaching learning, either. Our favorite article in this regard (not surprisingly) is by TLN Forum member and TLN blogger Bill Ferriter, with the unlikely (re: leadership) title, [Teacher] Learning with Blogs and Wikis." While Bill gives due attention to the power of blogs as a place to publicly reflect on your classroom practice (thereby inviting critical feedback), he also finds a good bit to say about teacher leadership.

In his essay, Bill recognizes that by sharing practice, teachers participate in a form of leadership, promoting collaboration and making teaching quality a high priority

…thousands of accomplished educators are now writing blogs about teaching and learning, bringing transparency to both the art and the science of their practice. In every content area and grade level and in schools of varying sizes and from different geographic locations, educators are actively reflecting on instruction, challenging assumptions, questioning policies, offering advice, designing solutions, and learning together. And all this collective knowledge is readily available for free.

But he also sees the connective power of the Internet as a never-before-possible tool for teacher leadership around policy issues and school improvement at district, state and national levels:

Although I enjoy the opportunities for reflection and articulation that digital tools have made possible, I see even greater potential in using blogs and wikis to gain influence as a teacher leader. Early on, I realized that I had valuable experiences to share with everyone from parents to policymakers. Now, in just over two years, my blog has attracted nearly 350 regular readers. No longer do teachers have to sit unsatisfied, wishing that we had more influence over our profession. Blogging has made it possible for all of us to be publishers and to elevate our voices to improve classroom practice.

Are you using the power of the Internet to share your insights and expertise with larger audiences? You need not wait to be invited to the table these days. The World Wide Web is the table.

Well-designed PD Still Scarce in USA

A new report on the status of professional development in the United States was released by the National Staff Development Council last week, with new Ed Secretary Arne Duncan lending his tacit endorsement by his attendance at the Washington press conference.

The study, co-authored by teaching quality expert Linda Darling-Hammond, describes the condition of teacher learning in America as generally fragmented, often isolated, and largely passive -- with little sustained commitment to create ongoing school-based professional learning environments that draw on teachers' collective knowledge and skills.

In the United States, say the report's authors, "We found that well-designed professional development is still relatively rare, and few of the nation’s teachers have access to regular opportunities for intensive learning."

Titled Professional Learning in the Learning Profession: A Status Report on Teacher Development in the United States and Abroad, the 36-page document includes "snapshots of the various ways in which professional learning is being redesigned in the rest of the industrialized world" and points to "strategies that we might consider adopting or expanding in this country."

“Most states and districts are still not providing the kind of professional learning that research suggests improves teaching practice and student outcomes,” said Darling-Hammond, who wrote the report with a team of researchers from Stanford University’s School Redesign Network. “The research tells us that teachers need to learn the way other professionals do—continually, collaboratively, and on the job. The good news is that we can learn from what some states and most high-performing nations are doing.”

NSDC executive director Stephanie Hirsh said the report is part of a multi-year effort that will track states’ progress over time and identify model policies and practices. “This first installment provides a baseline assessment of what works and what is happening in states and other nations,” she said. The project is begin funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, MetLife Foundation, and The Wallace Foundation.

This page at the NSDC website provides access to the report and to a presentation by the authors, which highlights PD differences between the U.S. and more high-achieving countries. There's also a link to the full technical report.

Once Upon a Time, in National Standards Land. . .

In a two-part post questioning the wisdom of investing time and reform energy in “national standards,” TLN blogger Nancy Flanagan takes us back in time to a strange land -- a parallel America where we not only knew which knowledge was important, we did something about it.

It’s the late 1980s. President Reagan has used the moral stimulus of A Nation at Risk to drive the creation of our first comprehensive United States curriculum standards and national assessments, which (predictably) have cost twice as much as budgeted to develop.

Out in the heartland, far from the rarified policy atmosphere of Washington D.C., School Superintendent Williams is walking the halls of Elmwood High, admiring its new state-of-the-art facilities, financed by a bond issue enthusiastically approved by voters to meet the new national standards.

Williams feels a great sense of accomplishment as he glimpses the shiny Selectric typewriters; the large fully-equipped photography lab; the technology room with its blazing fast 386 computers and DOS computer manuals; the handsome world maps in the history classrooms, brightly delineating the USSR; and finally, the cutting edge (and very expensive) security system for the school library, which will assure that the school’s extensive collection of hard-bound books will be available to help students “meet standards for decades to come.”

Superintendent Williams is well-satisfied. Elmwood High is set for the New Millennium. Party on, dude.