There seems to be broad agreement in the United States that improving the quality of the teaching force is a key to improving the performance of our students. But there is no agreement on how to do it. In this blog I want to characterize what I take to be the three leading strategies now on the table. Each is presented not necessarily as the only initiative that should be taken but rather as the most effective or efficient way to go. I will make a case that all are necessary if our aim is superior performance on the world stage. I'm indebted to Dylan Wiliam for this typology. Let's begin by the considering the three strategies currently front and center.
Fire the worst. First, there is the strategy offered by Eric Hanushek. In a 2009 essay, "Teacher Deselection," Hanushek presents what might almost be described as a surgical strike on the problem. Identify and then fire the worst five percent of our teachers. Do it often enough, he says, and those who remain will enable our students to perform at world-class levels.
Radically improve the quality of new teachers. Second, there is the strategy offered by my own organization, Vivien Stewart of the Asia Society and others. Observe the strategies already employed by the countries whose students are among the world's top performers and adapt them for use in the United States, the strategies they point to in accounting for their own success. These strategies concentrate on changing the pool from which we select our teachers, setting much higher standards for their initial education, training, induction and licensure and compensating them at levels comparable to the compensation offered to high status professionals.
Invest in those you already have. Third, there is the strategy suggested by Dylan Wiliam, which is focusing, not on new teachers entering the teaching force, but on those already in it. At the heart of this strategy is the finding of psychologists who study professional competence and expertise that the effect of selection strategies based, in effect, on IQ (see the second strategy above) washes out after a few years and that what really matters is the steady, disciplined improvement of professional skill. This finding, Wiliam says, points to a major effort to support the disciplined development of employed teachers' expertise as the core strategy for improving the quality of the teaching force.
Fire the worst. First, there is the strategy offered by Eric Hanushek. In a 2009 essay, "Teacher Deselection," Hanushek presents what might almost be described as a surgical strike on the problem. Identify and then fire the worst five percent of our teachers. Do it often enough, he says, and those who remain will enable our students to perform at world-class levels.
Radically improve the quality of new teachers. Second, there is the strategy offered by my own organization, Vivien Stewart of the Asia Society and others. Observe the strategies already employed by the countries whose students are among the world's top performers and adapt them for use in the United States, the strategies they point to in accounting for their own success. These strategies concentrate on changing the pool from which we select our teachers, setting much higher standards for their initial education, training, induction and licensure and compensating them at levels comparable to the compensation offered to high status professionals.
Invest in those you already have. Third, there is the strategy suggested by Dylan Wiliam, which is focusing, not on new teachers entering the teaching force, but on those already in it. At the heart of this strategy is the finding of psychologists who study professional competence and expertise that the effect of selection strategies based, in effect, on IQ (see the second strategy above) washes out after a few years and that what really matters is the steady, disciplined improvement of professional skill. This finding, Wiliam says, points to a major effort to support the disciplined development of employed teachers' expertise as the core strategy for improving the quality of the teaching force.
You need to be a member of School Leadership 2.0 to add comments!
Join School Leadership 2.0