The Tempered Radical

Building Parent Engagement in Schools

Larry Ferlazzo has been one of the most influential minds in my own personal learning network for a long while now.  I first stumbled onto Larry’s work when In Practice—a collaborative blog that Larry writes with two other thinkers I admire, Brian Crosby and Alice Mercer—was up for an Edublogs award a few years ago. 

That’s why I was so excited when Linworth Publishing agreed to send me a free review copy of Larry’s new book, Building Parent Engagement in Schools. 

(Note to FTC:  Does that qualify as a full disclosure statement?)

As usual, Larry doesn’t disappoint!  His text—designed to introduce schools to the kinds of strategies and actions necessary for moving parent participation in schools from involvement to engagement—details a series of key principles that define effective community engagement efforts AND a series of practical projects that communities could tackle tomorrow.

Living a Silent War. . .

Think that life in high needs schools isn't challenging? Then read this email from a first year teacher working in a school of poverty outside of Atlanta that was forwarded to me by a friend last week:

Amber and I volunteered to ride a bus today so that we could tell the parents they had to be at the stop or the children would be taken back to school and charged for after-school care. It was very mind opening to see the neighborhoods these children live in. There were several stops that we decided to get off the bus together because it was so scary.

Unfortunately five kids from my bus  had to be taken back to school because no one was there to pick them up---one who was a student in my class. After arriving back at school we had to wait for the parents to pick up their children and a little tiff broke out with the parent of my child. The parent said their neighbor was at the stop,  but they weren't---in fact, Ashley and I got off the bus, walked in the neighborhood, knocked on their door, and even called the emergency numbers with no answer. This is the same parent who got in a verbal argument on the first day and said it wasn't her responsibility to be at the bus stop....

Three of my students really stand out:

Child one: I found out that the same children (one of which is in my classroom) have been abused in the past and investigations are continuing, so I need to look out for abuse. On top of that, they have no lunch money and because my county is so big, the free and reduced lunch forms cannot be approved fast enough, so children bring lunch from home (which consists of practically nothing---cheese and bread---which the students do not eat).

Child Two: I stayed after and waited with a child until her grandmother came to pick her up from after school (which ended up being 6 pm). The child lives with grandma now because mom is in jail and we have no idea about the father. I have tried to call the grandmother everyday, and have even sent home notes on a daily basis. This girl has already been to the school counselor because she sporadically cries and becomes non-responsive.

After speaking with her kindergarten teacher, I realized that this is completely opposite behavior from last year so I decided to talk with grandma... since I consistently got no response on the phone, I waited... only to find out that grandma lost her job, and the phone, gas, and electric has been cut off. This child also struggles with being fed because grandma is not the legal guardian and thus cannot fill out the paperwork for free/reduced lunch---or so I have been told.

Child Three: This girl lives with dad and step-mom. They are trying to make ends meet, however mom is going to school and dad works full time (late hours, never home). They have three children, one a new-born and again no money. She is very needy and never has papers returned, behavior log signed---I call, and get no answer.

This is just three of my 15 children... all but two live in good home situations. I have children with severe behavior problems (due to the lack of structure at home, and one mother even tells him that when he acts inappropriately, "the devil is in his head"--obviously something you DO NOT tell a first grader!!!)

As I learn more about my students, I become more appreciative of my life, yet more discouraged with the world. This is exactly the type of students I want to work with... they need us more than ever. I am becoming more patient as I learn these shocking truths of my students. I have learned that not everyone has the tooth fairy visit them... so I don't ask when students lose teeth, "How much money did the tooth fairly leave you?" 

The answer is always none...

I have learned that most kids do not go home to mom or dad and get help with homework--they go home to an empty house. It's hard to understand how some of these students survive in the living conditions they were born into. Not that I didn't know it already... but I see how lucky I am to have had the "tooth fairy," "Santa Claus," stuffed animals, clean clothes, food, candy, tv, air conditioning, a clean bed, and parents always around. Sometimes I get home and it's hard for me to get my mind off of my children and whether or not they are safe, being fed, etc.

While there is so much sadness in these children's lives, they are, for the most part, incredibly happy children (at school). We have our times where discipline must be enforced, but these children are so good at keeping their lives a secret... no one would ever guess that these children are living a silent war that begins at 2:15 everyday.

The first two weeks are almost over and I have already learned so much. Each day is a new adventure... We've had bathroom accidents, several teeth have fallen out, crying fits that last for what seems hours... I collapse into bed each and every night. I hope you are having a good week... and even if you are having a bad day... just remember my kids...and how our lives could be worse... it's been a huge reality check for me... but I wouldn't change a thing.

Love,
Maggie

Maggie's words left me speechless---and wondering how long she'll remain in the classroom. Her spirit is positive and she approaches her work with a zeal that defines many of those who work with students of poverty, but will zeal be enough to keep her going day after day in the face of almost insurmountable challenges?

Her words also paint a clear picture of why schools serving high needs communities are often staffed by under-prepared educators. Long hours, constant criticism and heart-wrenching circumstances drive all but the most self-sacrificing educators to schools serving less demanding populations. 

When will we realize that equal funding, staffing and compensation for teachers in high needs schools is insufficient to ensure success for every child?  When will we begin to advocate instead for equitable funding, extra positions and additional salary supplements for those willing to work in difficult circumstances? 

Johnny Doolittle Heads to Capitol Hill…

A few weeks back, I had the opportunity to speak—at the invitation of the Center for Teaching Quality and the National Education Association—to an audience of educational policymakers in DC on Capitol Hill. The topic of the briefing was the challenges of recruiting and retaining teachers in high needs schools.

Needless to say, I was pretty geeked. It's not every day that a guy who is "just a teacher" has the ear of those who make decisions that shape our work. I was proud of myself, though—there was no "Shriek Heard 'Round the World" from me!

Here's what I said….Tell me what you think:

First, let me thank you for coming today to allow your thinking to be shaped by the voice of classroom teachers. As a passionate advocate for education, I've always believed that the best policies are those that are informed by practitioners because we possess a nuanced understanding of the culture of schools, and can quickly identify policy weaknesses that won't translate easily into our profession.

The issue of recruiting teachers to our highest needs schools is no exception. Understanding the importance of ensuring that schools of poverty are served by our most accomplished educators, decision makers are working diligently to craft policies to recruit teachers to the schools that need them the most. Those policies, however, tend to be under informed, over relying on alternative compensation models that incentivize work in high priority buildings.

Now don't get me wrong: I am a firm believer that the time has come to restructure teacher compensation in America.

But I also believe—based on my work with over 1,700 National Board Certified Teachers in five states on behalf of the Center for Teaching Quality, the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, the National Education Association and the Teacher Leaders Network—that new salary structures alone will not solve the staffing challenges faced by schools serving poor communities. In fact, while accomplished teachers rightfully expect additional compensation for accepting challenging assignments, financial incentives are rarely cited as the most important factor in a teacher's decision to work with children of poverty.

You see, our most accomplished educators rarely make decisions about where to work based on the socioeconomic status of their students. Instead, we're thoughtful and dynamic, driven by the desire to examine and perfect our craft. We are motivated by opportunities to reach our peak performance levels. As a result, schools with poor working conditions—regardless of the student population that they serve—rarely have a strong core of highly adept teachers and have little capacity to attract them.

So, which working conditions matter the most to teachers considering a move to a high needs building?

When highly accomplished teachers are asked to rank the top five factors that most influence their decisions about where to work, good principals inevitably end up on top of the list, followed by the opportunity to work with other skilled colleagues, having reasonable class sizes and student loads, and having access to instructional resources like science labs and classroom libraries. Financial incentives routinely finish in last place on the list.

These findings have been confirmed time and again in data points collected from the almost 250,000 teachers in ten states that completed a teacher working conditions survey since 2004. Analysis by the Center for Teaching Quality has shown that school leadership, professional development and empowerment are all strongly connected to student achievement and teacher retention. Additional findings include:

1. That schools reporting high levels of trust between faculty members are better able to help students learn.
2. That principals and teachers have greatly different perceptions about the presence of essential working conditions.

What implications do these findings have for policymakers?

The National Board Certified Teachers of North Carolina, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Washington and Ohio brainstormed a list of over 80 recommendations that are currently being used to drive change in their respective communities over the past two years. Some of the recommendations that seemed to translate across state boundaries included:

1. Invest in principal professional development programs that show school leaders how to better use accomplished teachers as change agents at the local level. NBCTs often report feeling undervalued and underutilized by their building administrators.
2. Provide time and training to teachers who accept positions in high needs communities. Meeting the academic and social demands of children living in poverty requires a set of skills that few educators automatically possess. Opportunities to engage in high quality, teacher driven professional development during the course of the school day and year will ensure that teachers feel success with economically and culturally diverse student populations.
3. Develop a range of financial incentives designed to attract teachers to high needs buildings. While salary supplements may appeal to young educators interested in raising their base pay, more experienced teachers are motivated by tax breaks, college tuition credits or additional years towards retirement. By developing a menu of incentives that teachers can choose from, we respect the personal and professional differences of our best educators.
4. Create hybrid roles that allow accomplished teachers to work part time in the classroom with students and part time beyond the classroom supporting colleagues as mentors and curriculum leaders. By doing so, we make what has become a stale profession more appealing to educators passionate about continued growth.
5. Begin using teacher working conditions as an indicator of school success on par with Annual Yearly Progress. By doing so, we focus attention on the significant connections between essential working conditions and student learning.

In the end, if there was one thing that accomplished teachers wanted you to take back to your work as education's decision makers, it would be that we have a responsibility to ensure that every child in America—including those living in poverty—has a great teacher. Meeting that responsibility, however, will require sophisticated solutions for what are very real and very complex problems.

Just Another Debate....

One of the teachers that I most admire is a woman named Mary who works with some of the highest needs students in one of the poorest counties in her state. She is at once passionate and intelligent, understanding the complexities of issues that other teachers rarely work to tackle. More importantly, Mary is an outspoken advocate on what it takes to help restructure schools in high needs communities.

Mary recently read my entry on staffing high needs schools and left the following comment that I wanted to highlight:

As I read Bill's eloquently written, researched based article, I can appreciate the depth of his views on the subject. Every child deserves our best but we know that it will not happen as long as the playing fields are not leveled.

The question that most grabbed me was when he asked, "Did I get a good education because of the neighborhood my parents elected as our place of residence?" Here in lies the truth and the painful reality of class, caste, systemic inequities. If we were to ask all children, "Who wants to be born in poverty?" we would get no takers. "Who wants to be taught by teachers that are not certifed, accomplished, and lacking in vision and preception?" we would get no takers.

So, how will we get equitable funding, resources, highly qualified teachers and administrators? Will it take a private institution's plan to raise the performance level of public schools' performance? The guilt Bill feels comes more from being part of a system that has biased practices, but he can't control how government spending is channeled. I wonder what it would take for Bill to leave his school system and school to teach the children who had no choice in the matter of parents, economic status, neighborhood, principal, or teacher.

While every challenge issue he raises is true and every proposed solution is what school systems like mine in Halifax County needs, I feel that it's impossible to fully understand what is needed in high needs schools unless you are willing to teach in those schools and live within a proximinity of those communities for more than one year.

While I agree in principle on many things Bill writes, the one thing that is crucial to success in high needs schools is the freedom to allow flexibility, creativity, and top notch leadership to flourish. I can almost guarantee that those essential principals are absent in low performing, high needs schools. The way to combat poverty is with resources. What most high needs schools are deprived of is economic, human, capital, and academic resources.

The true question remains,"Does my state consider the education of the children in my school significant enough to society to strategically address and provide empowering vehicles to bring about major changes in the current way high needs schools operate? Is our state willing to revamp the entire school's program and provide the same economic and substantial opportunities for learning that Bill's County and school district offers? If not, isn't this notion of addressing the real issues of high needs schools just another debate?

Not a Tool to Punish?

In advocating for the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind legislation at a ceremony honoring the nation's 50 teachers of the year last week, President Bush made a statement that I'm not sure I totally agree with. He said:

"Measurement is not a tool to punish.  Measurement is a tool to correct and reward."

I'm not sure that the rest of the critics who have made a living throwing darts at public schools over the past four years have gotten the message! End of grade test results are regularly used to label schools---to the detriment of students---as failures in the eyes of the public, whether it be the "A, B, C, or D" ratings given to Florida's "Zone" schools, North Carolina's "Priority Schools" tag or the dreaded "In Need of Improvement" label from the Federal Government. 

Hard-working principals and teachers in these buildings are subjected to ridicule and humiliation. Morale plummets and recruitment of new educators becomes difficult at best and impossible at worst.  All but the most self-sacrificing leave after a few years, looking for jobs in buildings where shame is not a part of the yearly routine.

Something tells me that routine public criticism rarely feels like a "reward" to the communities struggling with the myriad of challenges that contribute to poor results on the standardized tests of our nation.

Teach for America?

The Washington Post had an interesting article today on plans in the District of Columbia to recruit additional Teach for America teachers to high needs schools:

Teach for America, which has operated in the District since 1992, has 160 teachers working there this year. The number will grow to 250 in the fall, with 25 assigned to Prince George's schools. If the school systems agree, there could be 500 such teachers in the District and Prince George's by 2011, making Teach for America by far their largest supplier of new teachers. The expansion reflects what organization officials see as a new commitment to reform by the administration of D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) and Prince George's officials.

While I admire the commitment shown by Teach for America candidates, I question the decision to invest heavily in a program that has shown little significant impact on student achievement. By Teach for America's own standards, the only reliable study conducted on the impact that Teach for America recruits have on student achievement is a 2004 Mathematica piece titled The Effects of Teach for America on Students. 

The results of this study were less than impressive. While TFA teachers in the study did produce greater gains than those of comparable novice teachers, the gains merely brought struggling students from the 14th to the 17th percentile nationally. Even more disconcerting were quotes throughout the report like this one:

"The consistent pattern of positive or zero impacts on test scores...suggest that there is little risk that hiring TFA teachers will reduce student achievement."

Is providing students of poverty with teachers who have little risk of harming student achievement truly our goal?

The real focus of discussion should be on the incredibly poor qualifications of teachers currently working in our highest needs schools. In the Mathematica study, only 54.5% of all teachers and only 33% of novice teachers in the control group had degrees in education. High needs schools are filled with teachers on emergency and provisional certificates and are plagued with higher rates of teacher turnover.

I believe we should work as a nation to design comprehensive programs that recruit and retain some of our best teachers to our neediest schools. Doing so will take a focused commitment to improving working conditions for teachers in these buildings. Ground breaking work has been done in recent years by The Center for Teaching Quality---in partnership with the NEA---to bring teachers into the conversation, resulting in this report highlighting the conditions and incentives necessary for both recruiting and retaining teachers in our hardest to staff buildings.

Armchair Educators and School Reform....

I stumbled onto an interesting--albeit belated--strand of thinking the other day started by the Education Wonks when they wrote:

Why is it that so many would-be EduReformers (who are so quick to criticise our public schools) would never consider going into a classroom and actually work with children themselves?

We weren't the first one to notice....

Some of us who do serve children on a daily basis continue to be amazed at the large number of non-teaching teaching experts that are out there.

Maybe it would do many of 'em some good if these "armchair educators" went down to their local school district, filled out an application, and, if nothing else, did a little substitute classroom teaching.

We think that this person might find such an experience to be enlightening.

Matt Johnston, author of Going to the Mat, replied:

I will tell you why.

I am a taxpayer, I have a constitutional right and a duty to petition the government (that includes school boards, administrator and teachers) for a redress of my greivances. If that makes me an "armchair" edu-reformer then so be it and I will wear the title with pride.

I also can read data pretty well. The data tells me that our schools have not improved in nearly 40 years, that test scores have remained flat and that there are better methods available to be tried. I see evidence of reluctance to try anything new.

As an attorney, if my clients don't like my services, they are free to find other representation. Public school kids don't have that choice and so it is up to us parents and "armchair edu-reformers" to take up the cause--ca ause too many politicians, teachers and certainly the teachers unions have proven unfit for the task.

Now, I genuinely like Johnston. His work is reasoned and thoughtful, unlike critics of education that resort only to spitting venom. And in this case, I think he's got at least one legitimate point: Lack of school choice sentences students in underperforming schools to poor educations with no recourse. There is something inherently wrong in a system where we knowingly overlook the very real fact that some schools are serving children far better than others. Students of poverty deserve more.

We disagree on where the blame for this reality lies. When Johnston argues that teachers have proven unfit for the task, he is pointing fingers in the wrong direction. Teachers working in troubled schools face barriers that are almost insurmountable, attempting to address the social, emotional and academic challenges of children who have been overlooked by a society comfortable with the growing economic gap separating rich families from the poor. What's more, teachers in troubled schools often go without basic resources, time, parental support and professional development in facilities that are crumbling around them.

That's where the Ed Wonks argument that "Armchair Educators" should spend some time in schools carries weight. Once reformers realize exactly how little control teachers have over the results of "the system," they will be able to put the proper target in their crosshairs and offer real suggestions for driving change based on an understanding of the reality of our work.

 

Staffing High Needs Schools....

Reading about the Bush Administration's plans to force teachers to transfer to troubled schools left me remembering my neighborhood school, Northwoods Elementary.  Northwoods was a place where I felt safe, where my classmates were the same year after year and where parents were actively involved as tutors and PTA volunteers.  It was a place that neighbors could rally around and come together for events, building a sense of unity that spread across subdivisions and throughout our community.

The teachers at Northwoods were nothing short of outstanding.  I remember being involved in creative activities designed by Mr. Nowak and Mr. Tribula.  Mr. Earl, who was my band teacher, challenged me time and again.  Our school was consistently recognized for academic success because of the commitment of our teachers to continual growth, to one another and to their students.

There can be no question that the teachers of Northwoods were a significant factor in the success that the children of our community went on to experience.  Their accomplishment provided the foundation for ours.  In that sense, I understand the intent behind plans whose final goal is to guarantee that every child has the opportunity to experience a highly accomplished teacher.

But forced transfers to high poverty schools is yet another simplistic solution to a complex educational problem.  Until we make the serious investments necessary to restructure schools of poverty as places where accomplished teachers want to teach, we will fail in an endeavor that is at once well-intentioned and essential.

We need to begin by ensuring that our highest needs schools are led by our most accomplished administrators.  When principals work to develop a positive relationship with their faculties, the entire school benefits from the sense of collegiality.  As researcher Linda Darling-Hammond has written, effective school leadership has a "magnetic" effect, attracting accomplished teachers who are searching for environments that will allow them to reach their peak performance level.  Data from the North Carolina Teacher Working Conditions Survey supports Darling-Hammond's assertions--fully 30% of NC teachers cite school leadership as a significant factor in their decision to stay or to leave their current buildings.   

We can also provide accomplished teachers with the professional flexibility to do what it is that they do best:  identify needs and then design instruction tailored for the students in their classrooms.  Rigid attempts to control the work of teachers in high-needs schools chase away motivated educators who thrive on the mental creativity of the act of teaching.  As one of my colleagues recently wrote, "If I'm allowed to utilize my teaching expertise--to draw from what it is that I know will engage and stimulate my students--then students will achieve at levels that no one could dream of.  It is only when I'm hampered that I can't do what it is that I do best."

We can provide additional time and training to teachers in our highest needs schools and communities.  Meeting the academic and social demands of children living in poverty requires a set of skills that few educators--regardless of level of experience--are prepared for.  Opportunities to engage in high quality, teacher driven professional development during the course of the school day and year will help to ensure that teachers in high needs communities experience success with economically and culturally diverse student populations.

Finally, we can reconsider the use of external accountability models that result in schools of poverty being labeled "failures" in the eyes of the community.  We do little to emotionally reward teachers who work in high needs buildings--relying instead on their altruism as a retention strategy--and current accountability systems are loaded in favor of teachers in less demanding schools.  Such systems only serve to demoralize teachers and to discourage them from accepting difficult assignments.

Looking back, I'm challenged by my neighborhood school experience.  Sometimes I wonder, "Was I successful only because my parents were able to move into the right home in the right neighborhood with the right school?"  Neighborhood schools worked for my family, but who did they fail?  Wouldn't every parent--if they could--have chosen to move into my neighborhood.

What's more, I often feel a sense of shame for having spent the majority of my career working in affluent suburban schools.  My students have every advantage---and while I firmly believe that they deserve accomplished teachers as well, I know that I have, in a sense, avoided the children who need me the most.

But some part of me believes that the real shame belongs to educational decision makers who fail to commit energies and resources to addressing what is a very real and very complex problem.  We have a responsibility to all children...and to meet that responsibility, we must be able to guarantee that students of poverty have access to our most accomplished educators. 

Meeting that responsibility, however, requires more that simply reworking collective bargaining agreements to allow for forcible transfers of senior teachers to troubled schools. 

 

Digital Education and Class...

It seems as if Jane Van Galen and I have been swimming in the same digital soup lately. On her Education and Class blog, she recently wrestled with two topics that drive my thinking often: Introducing students to the tools of the Read/Write Web and addressing the needs of children living in poverty. Van Galen writes:

"As I click through the blogs describing innovative, engaging uses of classroom technology, I can seldom find mention of the kinds of kids present in these classrooms...

Here’s my concern: Web 2.0 could potentially transform the ways that poor and working-class kids think about the boundaries of their social worlds, their potential for developing a public voice, their ability to assume a greater measure of control over the circumstances of their lives.

Or, the innovations happening in only some schools could be yet another means by which the gap between these kids and their more privileged peers deepens, another way in which they come to school already “behind” other kids and with access to fewer resources in school to catch up."

My first reaction to Van Galen's thoughts is that few students of any economic background are engaged in meaningful digital learning opportunities in schools today. Technology applications remain limited and traditional. PowerPoint presentations, word processing and online research continue to dominate classroom computer use even in affluent schools with access to extensive resources. 

Even in communities that have invested heavily in one-to-one laptop initiatives and classroom technology systems that include interactive whiteboards and student response systems, instructional practices haven't significantly changed. Districts over-invest in hardware and software suites and under-invest in teacher professional development. We end up with what Mark Prensky describes as teachers doing "old things in new ways," instead of doing "new things in new ways."

But I also recognize that in the affluent school where I work, there is less pressure from outside "forces" bent on driving the curricular decisions of teachers. Instead of being forced to adopt scripted instructional programs that are closely monitored and supervised, teachers in my building still have the freedom to experiment, trying instructional practices that haven't been "approved for use" by decision makers far removed from the classroom. 

I imagine that external forces can act as handcuffs for teachers in low performing schools, limiting their ability to introduce the collaborative tools of the Read/Write Web to their students. When your school is facing state takeover or public ridicule because "student achievement" (read: standardized test scores) haven't met expectations, innovation is replaced by "research based" instructional practices (read: test preparation materials) chosen for their effectiveness at producing "results" (read: great multiple choice test takers).

What makes this reality even more frustrating is that children in high needs schools are far more likely to depend on teachers for exposure to technology. Personal computers and high speed Internet access are givens for the families that I serve, but are often cherished resources for children in many rural and urban communities. The technological experimentation that my students do at home—compensating for a lack of innovation in their classrooms—has to be introduced in high poverty schools in order to ensure that all students enter the 21st Century on a level playing field.   

That's why I was so jazzed to find out about the 21st Century Learning Project of the Alabama Best Practices Center. Working to introduce blogging, podcasting and wikis to several high needs schools, the Best Practices Center has continued its long history of driving meaningful change in education.  While these efforts (supported by a two-year Microsoft grant) continue to develop, the promise is clear in the work of the students at George Hall Elementary School, who are using WetPaint to create a schoolwide wiki/blog/podcast program documenting classroom field trips and learning experiences. 

It is also evident in the work of the students in Mr. Frazier's class at Hueytown Elementary School who are beginning to interact in a digital environment, leaving comments for one another in response to prompts on their classroom blog, and in Mrs. Carroll's class at West Blocton Elementary outside of Birmingham, where first graders are beginning to make their own blog posts, learning valuable lessons about the power of becoming creators of online content. Finally, it is evident in the developing wiki covering a range of classroom topics being created by students in Mrs. Barnett's class at Fayetteville High School in Talladega County.

Teachers in each of these high-needs schools have accepted the responsibility of truly preparing their students for life in tomorrow's world.  They've adopted Web 2.0 tools as effective "content delivery systems" (a term borrowed from my friend and colleague Sheryl Nussbaum Beach, lead consultant to the ABPC project), addressing required curriculum objectives and motivating students at the same time.  Their efforts are at once admirable and essential, serving as models of what technology integration should look like in any community.

 

Money Well Spent?

When my "box"  (the term used to describe the package sent by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards to introduce the process to new candidates) landed on my doorstep in late 1995, I was a third-year teacher tackling a process that was still relatively novel and new. My district--Wake County, North Carolina, currently leading the nation with 1,137 Board certified teachers--had nine teachers with completed portfolios. North Carolina--who now has just over 11,000 of our country's 55,000 NBCTS--had fewer than 90. 

Having earned a certificate in "the good old days"--and having recently renewed my certificate for the first time--I'm often interviewed on the process, asked about its value by educators and policymakers alike. "Why did you choose to pursue Board Certification?" people wonder, "What impact did it have on your instruction?"

Looking back, I think there were many reasons why I attempted to certify. First and foremost, I wanted a way to prove that I was an accomplished teacher. In my gut, I felt good about what I was doing in my classroom, but I had little evidence to back that up. Board certification gave me a chance to see how I stacked up against what is arguably the most rigorous assessment process for teachers in our nation. Certifying was confirmation of who I am as a professional. 

I was also driven by the desire to be one of the first to hold certification from the National Board.  There was something exciting about being from North Carolina in the mid-1990s. Our state had taken a strong step towards supporting quality teaching, and I saw certification as a way to validate those efforts.

Oh yeah....I also jumped at certification for another reason: North Carolina was offering a 12 percent salary supplement for certified teachers. Struggling to make ends meet, certification was a way to make a comfortable living wage. 

As states across the country began to experiment with monetary incentives for Board certified teachers--offering anything from one-time bonuses to long-term salary stipends--the number of teachers seeking certification multiplied exponentially. With rapid growth, education budgets buckled---what seemed like a manageable plan for providing differential pay ballooned into annual spending that became much more than policymakers bargained for. 

As a result, states began to back off of their commitment to the process, wondering whether or not their investments in teaching quality were making a difference. Competing studies about the impact of Board certified teachers on student growth were released by organizations across the professional--and political--spectrum. 

Grabbed by advocates and opponents of Board certification, these studies were used as "evidence" of the Board's successes and/or failures to improve teaching quality. Everyone started asking a seemingly simple question that I struggle to answer:

Is providing salary supplements to all Board Certified teachers a responsible fiscal decision?

My challenge lies in the fact that working through Board ceritification has changed who I am as a classroom teacher. The process taught me to reflect on my practice in ways that I never learned to do in my college preparation or teacher professional development sessions. I am a more critical practitioner, seeking to identify and amplify instructional practices that work for my students. That action orientation has had a direct impact on achievement in my classroom. 

Board certification has also encouraged me to accept leadership responsibilites beyond my classroom.  Mentoring teachers and advocating for students has become a central part of who I am. The credibility that comes with a certificate from the National Board has given me a "place at the table" in conversations about education---and I have used that opportunity to influence teaching and learning at the school, district, state and national level. 

But I've also spent my entire career working in affluent suburban schools. My students come from homes with every advantage. Their parents are supportive, providing extension and enrichment experiences for their children that families high poverty communities struggle to provide.  Being well-fed and warm is a given, the latest technology is common and success in school is an expectation. Few come to me with significant gaps in their knowledge--and those that do are often tutored outside of school. 

When you dig into the details in North Carolina, the majority of National Board Certified Teachers are working in low poverty schools--only ten percent of NBCTs work with our poorest children. This highlights the growing gap between students of wealth and students of poverty. As Howard Lee, the chairman of our State Board of Education recently said in an article on Board Certification in North Carolina, "If we're spending this kind of money, we should have the teachers where we need them the most."

Now, earning certification from the National Board does not guarantee that a teacher will automatically be successful in every setting because the challenges of a high needs school are complex and interwoven. Teachers in our neediest communities--regardless of certification status--require additional planning time, job-embedded professional development and accomplished leadership to maximize their effectiveness. Working towards providing these basics is essential if we are truly serious about leveling the playing field for every child.   

But I'm still left to wonder sometimes whether my decision to teach in a low poverty school cheapens North Carolina's investment in me.