Getting a well-trained teacher in every classroom is a generation-long project. It would require new approaches to training, higher entry standards and substantial opportunities for continued learning within the profession, including occasions for master teachers to mentor new ones.

How could we achieve this transformation? A good first step would be to raise standards for teacher licensure and simultaneously radically revamp teacher training over the first three years. Teacher tenure, now generally acquired after three years, would not be automatic: It would be more equivalent to making partner at a law firm or getting tenure at a university. The required assessment for tenure would not be a paper and pencil test, but a demonstration of actual teaching skill.

We need an education system that can do for teachers what medical residencies do for doctors. These institutions would be modeled after teaching hospitals, designed to provide vertically integrated training over the first three years, eliminating the current split between teacher preparation institutions responsible for year one and the school districts responsible for years two and three.

Teachers would learn to teach in these specialized residency schools, and they would gradually take on more responsibility as they showed more competence. These "teaching" schools would attract master teachers who want to educate new entrants to the profession and could also function as places to learn the latest in cutting-edge research and practice.

Such a system would assure the public that tenured teachers had met significant standards and signal to prospective teachers that teaching is a demanding endeavor. It would move teacher training into the "field" and support new teachers in their aims to meet raised standards.