Multi-classroom leaders in Opportunity Culture® schools in Metro Nashville share thoughts about why they love their jobs, in video from Public Impact®’s Opportunity Culture® Initiative. The video features interviews with, in order of appearance: Joi Mitchell,...
Beverley Tyndall
Recruiting in an Opportunity Culture®
What brings excellent teachers in droves to apply for jobs in hard-to-staff schools? Project L.I.F.T. in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District started by offering a complete Opportunity Culture package of career advancement roles, then advertised those roles early, often, and clearly—leading to a strong uptick in both the quantity and quality of applicants for teaching roles at schools that previously saw many positions go unfilled. L.I.F.T. leaders explain how they did it in this brief vignette.
Nashville Student Teachers Earn, Learn, Support Teacher-Leaders
Better-prepared new teachers, more adults in every classroom, more small-group instruction, more adults caring for every student—how can a school wrap all that up in one package? Three Metropolitan Nashville Opportunity Culture® schools are trying a novel approach...
Metropolitan Nashville’s Innovation Zone Case Study
Better-prepared new teachers, more adults in every classroom, more small-group instruction, more adults caring for every student—how can a school wrap all that up in one package? Three Metropolitan Nashville Opportunity Culture schools are trying a novel approach with paid, yearlong student teaching positions. In this case study, Public Impact examines this “aspiring teachers” program and its early implementation.
Opportunity Culture® Principals: “People Want to Be a Part of This”
Now, it’s the principals’ turn: We’ve shared videos of multi-classroom leaders and team teachers telling why they love their jobs in the Metro Nashville schools that have created an Opportunity Culture. Hear why the principals at Bailey STEM Magnet Middle School and Buena Vista Elementary call an Opportunity Culture “sustainable,” “innovative,” and the “it factor” in changing the game for students and teachers. These principals’ schools use multi-classroom leadership, setting up the feedback loops from team teaching, collaboration, and teacher-leadership that they and their teachers revel in.
“Absolutely the most powerful benefit is student achievement”
“You make sure that every single child is in a top-quality classroom”
“Teachers are applying at newfound rates to be a part of this work”
And watch this blog! We’ll have more videos to come in 2015 from other Opportunity Culture sites, such as Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Cabarrus County, N.C., and Syracuse, N.Y.
Team Teachers Tell All! Why Opportunity Culture® Teams Work
Before Thanksgiving, we shared this video of Metro Nashville multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) telling why they love what they do; now, hear their team teachers share why they love working on MCL teams in an Opportunity Culture! Lead teachers at Buena Vista Elementary serve on MCL teams with “aspiring teachers” who work in yearlong, paid student teaching positions. As you’ll hear, they get the sort of daily, immediately useful, on-the-job feedback and collaboration that teachers say they crave, and that is a hallmark of Opportunity Culture school models (see the Opportunity Culture Principles). “Invaluable,” “amazing,” “really resourceful,” the teachers say–see why!
Coming Wednesday: Opportunity Culture principals tell why an Opportunity Culture is “the new frontier” for all schools.
Giving thanks for Opportunity Culture® Multi-Classroom Leaders
Need more to be thankful for this year? Add these committed, enthusiastic, deeply determined teacher-leaders to your list! I recently interviewed multi-classroom leaders in in three Metro Nashville schools that use Opportunity Culture models. Videographer Beverley Tyndall and I couldn’t wait to share at least a few bits of these inspiring interviews, and we’ll soon be posting more videos from Opportunity Culture team teachers and principals–for whom we’re also quite thankful! For now, enjoy hearing just a bit about why these teacher-leaders love what they do!
Opportunity Culture® Toolkit
This toolkit helps schools and districts create an Opportunity Culture for students and teachers, in which all students have access to excellent teachers and their teaching teams, consistently, and all teachers have well-paid, financially sustainable career advancement opportunities and rigorous, job-embedded development. The toolkit offers step-by-step guidance for choosing and implementing the school models that allow great teachers and their teams to extend their reach to more students, for more pay, within budget.
How the STEM Teacher Shortage Fails Kids–and How to Fix It
In the U.S., STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and math) get a lot of press lately. But it’s still hard for leaders to connect the dots: Too few skilled STEM teachers lead to too few students embracing STEM subjects, leading to too few STEM-trained workers to fill available jobs. The consequences for students-turned-job-seekers, businesses, and the U.S. economy—where STEM jobs are an economic growth multiplier—are enormous.
The statistics are grim. In Reaching All Students with Excellent STEM Teachers: Education Leaders’ Brief and the accompanying slide deck, Public Impact lays them out and then explains how Opportunity Culture school models can help. These models extend teachers’ reach to more students, for more pay, within budget, by saving teachers time and letting them lead peers while teaching in new career paths.
This report is part of Public Impact’s commitment to 100Kin10, a national network of more than 150 partners responding to the national imperative to train 100,000 excellent STEM teachers in 10 years and keep our best STEM teachers in the classroom.
“Many of 100Kin10’s partners focus on changing the opportunities and support available to STEM teachers,” says Talia Milgrom-Elcott, executive director and co-founder of 100Kin10. “Public Impact’s Opportunity Culture effort to extend the reach of excellent teachers and pay them far more is a powerful way to address teacher shortages and retention challenges.”
Who needs this new brief and slide deck?
- District leaders—to learn how to improve your STEM efforts
- Teachers—to support your advocacy for meaningful professional learning and advancement
- Teacher-prep programs—to grasp how grim things are,and steer aspiring STEM teachers toward districts offering better career opportunities
- State policymakers—to grasp why tinkering at the edges of traditional school models isn’t enough, and how policies can make an Opportunity Culture schools feasible statewide
- Business leaders—to understand the root of the STEM employee shortage, and to learn what education reforms will help close the gaps
- Reporters—to understand the background statistics and ways of addressing the STEM shortage
Opportunity Culture pilot schools are already attracting far more STEM teachers, by extending the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for significantly higher pay, within regular budgets. Early implementers received 30 applications for each open position, even in high-poverty schools that could not fill positions previously. Those are teachers who otherwise might be tempted away by the higher pay and multiple advancement opportunities of other STEM careers.
In an Opportunity Culture, students can experience consistent access to excellent STEM teaching. Great teachers can stay in the classroom while they advance. They lead teams on the job with clear authority and time to plan and collaborate, specialize in their best subjects, or use age-appropriate amounts of digital instruction, without having to increase class sizes.
Excellent STEM teachers in Opportunity Culture schools are already earning 10 to 50 percent pay supplements from within their schools’ regular budgets, not temporary grants.
Reaching All Students with Excellent STEM Teachers
In the U.S., STEM subjects—science, technology, engineering, and math—face urgent needs for great STEM teachers and well-educated students. An Opportunity Culture can help by extending the reach of excellent STEM teachers already in our schools and creating a teaching profession that attracts and retains these teachers through higher pay, within regular budgets, and multiple advancement opportunities.