In K–12, decades of reforms have produced vanishing outcomes. Instructional methods and materials with eye-popping results in small studies fizzle out when scaled.
Then, true believers double down on intensive teacher training and coaching to get their reform “done right.” But intensive support is far too expensive to reach a whole district, let alone 3 million teachers. Without enough support, overall results don’t budge. Scale fail eventually casts doubt on even the most impressive strategies.
The key to scaling successfully? Teacher leadership. Critical steps?
1) Add real teacher-leader roles—where team leaders have authority to lead and share accountability with team teachers for student results across whole grades or subjects.
2) Make them selective. Choose teacher-leaders for prior high-growth student learning, or similar measures. These teachers already use instructional materials and methods more effectively than others.
3) Focus training and coaching on teacher-leaders. They spread what works to their teams, so training them makes the unscalable scalable, within budget. If they lead an average of 5 teachers each, training one leader reaches up to 6 times the number of students as training one teacher. Training costs a mere 15–20% to reach the same number of students. That’s 5–6 times the impact per dollar.
4) Schedule time for planning and collaboration. Teacher-leaders need time to plan with their teams, lead lesson practice and prep, review student data, adjust instruction collaboratively, and coach team members. In our data, those who still teach a class or courses part of the day get results just as good as those who don’t—and are just as exuberant about their roles (video below)—but they need enough time set aside each day to lead.
Higher pay, permanently funded, is also critical, and more. But the steps above are a start.
Want evidence and examples? Matthew Kraft and colleagues found that teacher coaching gave students an extra 3.6 months of learning in programs reaching 100+ teachers. Studies of Opportunity Culture teacher-leadership—with coaching embedded in teams—documented a 4.5-month learning boost, on average (N size~275 teachers per study).
Organizations training teacher-leaders include Leading Educators, led by Chong-Hao Fu, TNTP, led by Tequilla Brownie, and Teach Plus, led by Kira Orange Jones. At the state level, organizations like BEST NC and Tennessee SCORE can help to reach more educators and students.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools has boosted learning for a decade with this approach, now led by Crystal Hill and Nancy Hicks Brightwell. Across the country, New Mexico’s Carlsbad Municipal Schools sees the same impact with Gerry Washburn and LaVern Shan at the helm.
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