An Opportunity Culture restructures pre-K–12 schools to extend the reach of excellent teachers, principals, and their teams to more students, for more pay, within recurring school budgets. Yearlong, paid residencies make on-the-job learning possible before teaching and leading.
Opportunity Culture is:
- Grounded in five key design principles
- Research-based
- Found in districts across the U.S.
- Continually refined and strengthened by all Opportunity Culture educators, including Opportunity Culture Fellows
- Valued by educators
Why do schools need Opportunity Culture? Watch this video to learn more!

In each Opportunity Culture school:
- A design and implementation team of teachers and administrators determines how to use Multi-Classroom Leadership and other roles to reach more students with teachers who have demonstrated high-growth student learning.
- Multi-classroom leaders lead a teaching team, providing guidance and frequent on-the-job coaching while continuing to teach, often by leading small-group instruction.
- Accountable for the results of all students in the team, multi-classroom leaders also earn supplements averaging 20 percent (and up to 50 percent) of teacher pay, within the regular school budget.
- The schools redesign schedules to provide additional school-day time for teacher planning, coaching, and collaboration.

The Opportunity Culture Principles
- Reach more students with excellent teachers and their teams
- Pay teachers more for extending their reach
- Fund pay within regular budgets
- Provide protected in-school time and clarity about how to use it for planning, collaboration, and development
- Match authority and accountability to each person’s responsibilities
Similar principles apply to teams of principals and district/network leaders
Research-based

- were on average at the 50th percentile in student learning gains…
- who then joined teams led by teacher-leaders known as multi-classroom leaders, or MCLs (who had prior high growth as teachers)…
- produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers from the 75th to 85th percentile in math, and, in six of the seven statistical models, from 66th to 72nd percentile in reading.
Opportunity Culture meets ESSA requirements for an evidence-based intervention for schools in need of improvement.

Found in districts across the U.S.

Continually refined and strengthened
