In two new podcasts, hear superintendents from Carlsbad, New Mexico, and Madison Parish, Louisiana speak about how Opportunity Culture® staffing designs have led to state-leading student growth. In a new video, watch Carlsbad teaching team members as they support one another to drive student success. Plus catch the latest news on certification, upcoming events, and tools to use now. Read the December 2025 newsletter here!
Public Impact
Carlsbad Connections: How Teaching Teams Mesh for Success
In this video, MCL™ team members share how MCL™, MTRT, and RA™ roles support one another to drive student success, with their schools in Carlsbad, New Mexico, posting state-leading math and literacy results this year.
20. For Louisiana District, HQIM + Opportunity Culture® Teams Sparks Early Wins
When Charlie Butler returned to his hometown to become superintendent of the Madison Parish School District in northeastern Louisiana, he was looking for innovative ways to help the persistently low-performing system. With help from a state “instructional coherence cohort,” the district combined the support of Opportunity Culture® teaching teams with a focus on the implementation of high-quality instructional materials to address longstanding issues—and quickly started to see successes for both students and educators. In this podcast, district and state leaders describe how they worked together to make it happen.
So You Got High Learning Growth—Now What?
As learning growth results continue to come in across the U.S. for the 2024–25 year, educators in many high-growth schools may find their celebrations tinged with an edge of dread. They and their students worked so hard for their results—but what now?
Many organizations, not just schools, find sustaining high performance just as hard as achieving it. In schools, the challenges include:
19. Superintendents Speak: Vacancies Plummet, Student Results Rocket in Carlsbad, New Mexico
When Carlsbad Municipal Schools Superintendent Gerry Washburn joined the district, it was facing high teacher vacancies and low student success—and a lot of low morale. A chance conversation with Ector County, Texas, Superintendent Scott Muri showed Washburn a new option—Opportunity Culture® school redesign. With inclusive leadership and a determination to get design and implementation of new staffing roles right, plus a strong district team and principals, Washburn saw schools begin to soar and lead the state: “I’ve been stunned at the acceleration that we’re seeing.”
Redesigning school staffing for student success
From The Education Gadfly Show, October 22, 2025
In Episode #991 of The Education Gadfly Show, Bryan Hassel, co-president of Public Impact, joins the hosts Michael J. Petrilli, David Griffith, and Adam Tyner to discuss how redesigning school staffing—through models like Opportunity Culture®—can boost both teacher retention and student success. Listen to the episode here.
October 2025 Newsletter: With MCL™ Teams, Up to 3X Rate of High-Growth Learning
North Carolina schools with Certified Opportunity Culture School® status were two to three times more likely to exceed learning growth expectations than schools not using Opportunity Culture® staffing design—learn more in our latest newsletter. Plus, read our blog about Opportunity Culture® staffing models being discussed in the U.S. Senate; listen to a conversation with the Greene County, N.C., superintendent on our podcast; and check out an op-ed from the superintendent of Midland ISD in Texas. All this and more in the October 2025 newsletter!
North Carolina Data: Up To 3X More Learning Growth in Schools Using Opportunity Culture Staffing Designs
October 1, 2025, CHAPEL HILL, N.C.—In 2024–25, hundreds of North Carolina schools with Certified Opportunity Culture School® status were two to three times more likely to exceed learning growth expectations than schools not using these designs, data from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction shows.
Opportunity Culture staffing design affects both instruction and human resources by extending the reach of excellent teaching to more students, for more pay, within regular budgets. Schools create Multi-Classroom Leader® teaching teams, which are led by a teacher with a record of high-growth student learning. A team of teachers and administrators at each school determines the exact team design, and schools vary significantly in their design, curricula, and instruction. Schools can receive certification from Public Impact, which created the Opportunity Culture initiative, by following a set of design standards correlated with student learning growth.
Of all 258 certified schools, 48% exceeded growth targets, compared with 25% of all schools in the state without Multi-Classroom Leader (MCL™) teams.
Of the 222 Title I schools with certification, 43% exceeded growth targets, compared with 21% of Title I schools without the teams.
The certified schools were also significantly less likely to fall short of growth targets than comparable schools in the state. Although Title I schools using these teams without certification were also more likely to exceed growth targets and less likely to fall short, the magnitude of differences was far larger for certified schools.
#18. Superintendents Speak: Choosing to Use Opportunity Culture® Design, on Fast Timeline
In the first of an occasional “Superintendents Speak” series, Superintendent Rodney McNeill of Greene County and Superintendent Rodney Peterson of Person County discuss why they chose to use Opportunity Culture® models in their districts, and why they elected to have their districts go through a fast-track design workshop together in the spring, to be able to begin using Multi-Classroom Leader® teaching teams in the fall. Both districts feel the pressure of nearby, larger districts—and districts already using Opportunity Culture® models—that are able to pay teachers more.
How to keep teachers: Provide a complete package
From District Administration, by Dr. Stephanie Howard, September 12, 2025
District leaders say they want to keep great teachers. But how often do actions match the promise?
Too often, districts spend far more time doing what it takes to recruit teachers than to retain, equip and empower them. To retain teachers, they need a complete package of preparation, support, career growth and compensation—and now we know how to do just this.
Our profession has operated on a revolving-door mentality—a person leaves and we hire a person to replace them—instead of thinking about how we can build on the expertise we already have and using our best talent to impact more people.
With these teams, leaders and teachers can earn more by extending their reach to more students, and we make sure the extra pay is sustainable by reallocating regular budgets.
Advanced paraprofessionals and paid, yearlong teacher residents focus on leading small-group tutoring, providing meaningful support to their teams and creating a clear path into teaching—where they feel set up for success from day one.
The good news is that this complete package of educator support leads to powerful results for students. In Midland ISD, we have seen this firsthand since resetting our Opportunity Culture staffing model; 18 of 22 schools saw learning gains. One school went from a state-assigned “D” letter grade to a B, increasing by 25 points; many others went up by at least 12 points.