Featured Publications

A Complete Opportunity Culture, For All: Summary —Research shows that educators in Multi-Classroom Leadership roles lead teaching teams to move from achieving average student learning growth to growth like or approaching that of top teachers. This two-page brief explains how a complete Opportunity Culture model can maintain these results and extend them to all preK–12 students and both current and aspiring educators.

Understanding the Opportunity Culture Principles—This two-page guide helps schools and districts implementing Opportunity Culture school models and roles interpret the five Opportunity Culture Principles. The principles help schools ensure that roles extending the reach of excellent teachers and principals to far more students, and to their colleagues, are sustainable and effective.

An Excellent Principal for Every School: Transforming Schools Into Leadership Machines—This idea paper lays out a vision for how districts can reach dramatically more students with great principals, for much higher pay, within budget—giving principals a career path that keeps them connected to students and schools through the Multi-School Leadership role. 

Paid Educator Residencies, Within Budget: How New School Models Can Radically Improve Teacher And Principal Preparation—This brief details how to create paid, full-time, yearlong residencies for aspiring teachers and principals, within existing budgets. Aspiring teachers become part of a Multi-Classroom Leadership team, while aspiring principals receive intensive coaching and support from a multi-school leader and a team of principals.

Excellent Teaching for Every Young Child: Opportunity Culture in Early Childhood Education—How could far more children ages 0–5 who are in early childhood education and care settings have consistent access to excellent teaching? Opportunity Culture models can also be applied to early childhood settings. Public Impact’s vision brief explains how, and shows the potential benefits for students, educators, and the country.

Opportunity Anew: How Excellent Educators Can Lift Up Their Colleagues, Students, and the Nation in the Wake of Covid-19—In the wake of Covid-19, the U.S. preK–12 education system needs more than a refresh. We need to think anew. This brief recommends the means through federal policy to bring critical, effective instructional and emotional supports to millions of teachers and their students—for a price tag the country can not only afford, but sustain long-term.

Multi-Classroom Leadership—The Multi-Classroom Leadership role is the cornerstone of an Opportunity Culture model. Teachers with a record of high-growth student learning and leadership competencies, known as Multi-Classroom Leaders or MCLs, both teach part of the time and lead small, collaborative teams of two to eight teachers, paraprofessionals, and teacher residents in the same grade or subject to meet each MCL’s standards of excellence. 

Better Together: Combining the Multi-Classroom Leadership Role with Team Reach—This brief slide deck describes the many benefits of combining the Multi-Classroom Leadership role with Team Reach. These benefits include reaching more students with available teachers and/or increasing teacher planning time, pay, and career advancement opportunities.

Multi-Classroom Leadership in Special Education—The Multi-Classroom Leadership model, alone or in combination with Team Reach, can be used by special education (SPED) teachers. This brief describes four examples of how to reach all students who have disabilities with excellent teaching—three in inclusive models and one in self-contained SPED classrooms.

Multi-School Leadership —Opportunity Culture multi-school leaders (MSLs) are excellent principals with a record of high-growth student learning who lead a small group of two to eight related or closely located schools for more pay, funded within the budgets of their schools. Read a one-page summary of the model here; see here for additional tools to aid districts’ design and implementation of the model.

Opportunity Culture Teaching Residencies—In Opportunity Culture schools, the Multi-Classroom Leadership role creates the potential for aspiring teachers to experience paid, full-time, yearlong residencies led by excellent teachers who lead small instructional teams, offered in collaboration with participating educator preparation providers.

Days in the Life: The Work of a Successful Multi-Classroom Leader—How do Opportunity Culture Multi-Classroom Leaders fit into a typical week all their duties? This vignette and accompanying video follow Okema Owens Simpson, a middle school Multi-Classroom Leader, through several typical days in which she provides what her teaching team needs most to get the best student results.

The Science of Reading Introduction: Understanding the Simple View of Reading —This introductory slide deck details the simple view of reading equation—Decoding X Language Comprehension = Reading Comprehension—and distinguishes misleading conventional wisdom from facts based on research about teaching methods that boost students’ reading comprehension. Start here, then turn to the Study and Action Guide for a structured process to put the science of reading into action. For speaker notes, see here.

The Science of Reading Study and Action Guide: Improving Your Multi-Classroom Leadership Team’s Instruction—This guide is intended to help Multi-Classroom Leaders, their teaching teams, and other teachers improve reading instruction and student learning growth fast. This short slide deck provides a structured process and action planner for improving curricula and teaching methods based on research, to improve reading instruction over one year, or faster by targeting critical instructional gaps. For speaker notes, see here.

The Science of Reading Part 1: Reading Comprehension Overview—Part 1 of this three-part training series providing guidance on the latest research in reading comprehension defines the elements of reading comprehension and why each matters, and identifies ways that teachers in all content areas can develop students’ comprehension skills. For speaker notes, see here.

The Science of Reading Part 2: Explicit Comprehension Instruction—Part 2 of this three-part training series providing guidance on the latest research in reading comprehension focuses on a critical, research-based approach to supporting students’ textual meaning-making. For speaker notes, see here.

The Science of Reading Part 3: Multi-Classroom Leader/Team Leader Study and Action Guide—Part 3 of this three-part training series providing guidance on the latest research in reading comprehension identifies the next steps for systematically improving your team’s explicit comprehension instruction together. For speaker notes, see here.