Teacher Quality and School Improvement in 2010: P-20 in Historical Perspective

1. Teacher Quality and School Improvement in 2010:P-20 in Historical Perspective Steve Tozer, UIC stozer@uic.edu

2. What we learned in graduate school • Schools don’t really affect student learning; it’s SES that does. • Cultural Deficit Theory • (Coleman, Jencks, 1960s)

3. 1970s Effective Schools Research (Edmonds) • "How many effective schools would you have to see to be persuaded of the educability of poor children? If your answer is more than one, then I submit that you have reasons of your own for preferring to believe that pupil performance derives from family background instead of school response to family background.”

4. 1980s Nation at Risk • School Reform as a national priority • State legislation to improve schools • Beginning of the standards movement

5. 1990s: The Standards Movement • What Matters Most . . . • The quality of classroom instruction • NBPTS, NCTAF, IPTS • PK-12 Learning Standards

6. 2000s: Transforming Schools at Scale • Kati Haycock and the Education Trust • NCLB (2001) • Marzano: What Works in Schools (2003) • Chenoweth: It’s Being Done (2007) • CCSR: Five Essential Supports (2010)

7. Consortium for Chicago School Research

8. The Big Three: Students, Teachers, and Leaders • Joanne Weiss (Race to the Top) • “. . . and that means we have to get the leadership right first.” (2010)

9. Improving Classroom Instruction at Scale • The importance and limits of teacher preparation and certification • Where does most teacher learning take place? • Schools as adult learning environments

10. Leadership Quality as essential to Teacher Quality • Are high quality principals born or made? • Eight years of results • New York School Leaders Academy • New Leaders for New Schools • UIC

11. What they have in common • Partnerships with school districts • High selectivity • Intensive, year-long internships • Integration of Theory and Practice • Results accountable to improved student learning

12. Sample Results from UIC • In the highest-need schools in CPS: • Improved test scores at elementary and secondary levels • Improved attendance in elementary and secondary schools • Improved freshman-on-track in large and small high schools • Reduced drop-out rates and increased graduation rates

13. What about the Market Model solutions? • Charters, alternative routes, turnarounds and “breaking the higher ed monopoly” • Absent good leadership, charter schools fail • Charter schools now seek strong leadership as the key to success • Evidence: Alternative routes to teaching are neither the solution nor a problem

14. Why is improved school leadership so essential? • Because high-quality instruction in every classroom cannot otherwise be attained • We have no viable alternative theory for improving teacher quality at scale

15. How do we know our principal work-force isn’t good enough? • Good principals dramatically improve student performance • Most principals do not • Principals have been caught in a historical paradigm shift

16. Keys to Improving School Leadership in Illinois • Must be highly selective • Must be clinically intensive • Must involve school districts and expert practitioners as partners • Systemic, cost effective approach to (a) changing higher ed’s relationship to PreK-12, and (b) improving learning outcomes

17. Higher Education has changed before • 1909: The Flexner Report • 1910-1920: Resulting revolution in medical education • (Highly selective, clinically intensive, partnership with hospitals) • Ratio of physicians to principals in Illinois is 3:1; it can be done

18. The P-20 challenge: • Paying attention to what we already know: because teaching matters, leadership matters • Marshalling the state leadership and political will • Pending school leadership legislation in Illinois: using our greatest levers systemically