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Opportunity Culture by the Numbers: 2017-18 Dashboard Updates

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on March 16, 2018

Quick Stats from the Opportunity Culture Dashboard, updated for 2017-18:

  •  225+ schools committed to Opportunity Culture
  • 1,450+ teachers with advanced roles or on-the-job development
  • 41,000+ students reached by excellent teachers extending their reach
  • $3.3 million in extra pay for teachers in 2017–18; $10 million since Opportunity Culture was implemented in the first schools five years ago
  • 22 Opportunity Culture sites in 9 states—and growing
  • Strong educator support: 97% of surveyed multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) and 81% of all school staff involved in OC want Opportunity Culture to continue in their schools
  • High growth by MCL-led team teachers: Math gains rose from 50th percentile of teachers to 75th–85th, reading from 50th percentile of teachers to 66th–72nd

Public Impact, which created and leads the national Opportunity Culture initiative, updates the Opportunity Culture dashboard annually.


Details:

  • Schools—Opportunity Culture now has 228 schools committed; OC grew from 7 schools implementing in 2013–14 to 111 schools in 2017–18. Forty-six more schools have begun designing (planning for implementation) for 2018–19, and states and districts have committed to launch Opportunity Culture in an additional 71 schools in the next few years. Schools, cities, and states continue to join Opportunity Culture throughout each year.
  • Sites—9 states now have a total of 22 Opportunity Culture sites covering a range of urban, suburban, and rural schools.
  • Students—More than 41,000 students were reached by one or more Opportunity Culture teachers. Nothing matters more for students than getting excellent teaching consistently: Excellent teachers help students learn more, and, as multi-classroom leaders, they can help other teachers produce higher-growth student learning, too. Research also says that teachers producing high growth develop students’ higher-order thinking skills.
  • Teaching Roles—There were 331 teachers in advanced roles and 1,135 teachers receiving on-the-job development on teacher-led teams. Advanced Opportunity Culture roles are reserved for teachers with a track record of high-growth student learning. Team teacher roles are held by teachers with a typical range of prior effectiveness. Schools designing Opportunity Culture before 2017–18 used a variety of roles to extend teachers’ reach. Schools designing in 2017–18 and after will all use Multi-Classroom Leadership, embedding other roles within MCLs’ small teams.
  • Teacher Surveys—In anonymous surveys, 97 percent of multi-classroom leaders and 81 percent of all school staff involved in OC want Opportunity Culture to continue in their schools.  94 percent of MCLs also reported a positive impact on staff collaboration and student achievement; 96 percent agreed that they have new leadership opportunities; and 95 percent agreed they have better pay opportunities and the chance to reach more students. And 96 percent of MCLs and 89 percent of all OC teachers agree that they receive feedback that can help them improve teaching.
  • Pay—$3.3 million was reallocated to higher teacher pay in 2017–18; $10 million has been reallocated since OC began in 2013. The highest pay supplement was $23,000 (for MCLs). The average MCL supplement was $12,247, or 21 percent of the average teacher salary in the U.S. OC supplements for all teachers ranged from $1,500 to $23,000.
  • Student Results—A study from the American Institutes for Research and the Brookings Institution showed that students in classrooms of team teachers led by MCLs showed sizeable academic gains. The team teachers in the study were, on average, at the 50th percentile in the student learning gains they produced before joining a team led by an MCL. After joining the teams, they produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers in the top quartile in math and nearly that in reading.

See the dashboard for more details.

Public Impact analyzes the dashboard results so we can continually improve Opportunity Culture materials and our work with schools and districts. Our goals are to reach all students with excellent teaching and all teachers with outstanding career opportunities and support.

“We are grateful to the hundreds of teachers, principals, and district staff nationally who have stepped out of their comfort zones to achieve more for students through Opportunity Culture,” said Emily Ayscue Hassel, co-founder of the Opportunity Culture initiative and Public Impact co-president. “Public Impact treasures both the feedback from these educators and the hard data to make Opportunity Culture even better for people as it grows.”


How Does an Opportunity Culture Work?

In each Opportunity Culture school, a team of teachers and administrators adopts new roles to reach more students with teachers who have produced high-growth student learning. Multi-classroom leaders lead a small 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, they 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.

Learn more at OpportunityCulture.org; hear from Opportunity Culture educators in teacher-written columns and videos.

We welcome your questions and feedback; contact us here.

 

Beyoncé and Teacher Pay: TEDx Talk Tells All!

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on December 7, 2017

What does Beyoncé have to do with great teachers? Ranson IB Middle School Principal Erica Jordan-Thomas wants you to know:

“There are Beyoncé educators in every single school building dropping number 1 albums year after year in the form of mind-blowing results with their kids.”

But, Jordan-Thomas says in her just-posted Fall 2017 TEDx talk, those Beyoncé educators are being held back by the traditional one-teacher, one-classroom setup in most schools. And there just aren’t enough Beyoncé educators to fill every U.S. classroom.

[Read more…]

Opportunity Culture Voices: New Series in The 74

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on March 15, 2017

A decade ago, inspired by the best teachers we’ve known, we formed the seed of an idea — the notion that great teachers, those who induce high-growth learning and strong student thinking skills, could and should have far more power to lead instruction, help colleagues succeed, and innovate to reach more students. For a lot more pay.

Why? Because without high-growth learning consistently, students who start behind stay behind. Yet far too few teachers teach at that level consistently. And without pay to match more demanding expectations, these great teachers will keep leaving classrooms for administration and other professions.

When we finally published the idea in 2009, with more details in 2010, education leaders’ responses ranged from a head-scratching “What is this?” to “Here are the reasons this can’t work….” Only a few got it right away.

But when our team began working with schools in 2012, the odds flipped: Nearly every teacher understood immediately. Pioneering teachers in what became the “Opportunity Culture” initiative took these seeds and grew them into results.

–Emily Ayscue Hassel and Bryan C. Hassel, in Teachers in an Opportunity Culture: Well-Paid, Powerful, and Accountable

Jimmel Williams, a master reach teacher in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, teaches at one of the more than 100 Opportunity Culture schools currently in the U.S.

Jimmel Williams, a math master reach teacher in Charlotte, teaches at one of the 100+ Opportunity Culture schools currently in the U.S.

Today, Public Impact Co-Directors Emily Ayscue Hassel and Bryan C. Hassel bring the Opportunity Culture series to The 74, whose motto is  74 Million Kids. 74 Million Reasons to Talk Education. Columns for The 74 will come from Opportunity Culture educators eager to share what their jobs are like, the differences they make for students, and the lessons they’ve learned as they extend the reach of their great teaching to many more students.

“We and these great teachers are grateful for the chance to share — because we’re all tired of reading columns about what should be done in education, when we know that something amazing is already happening. In the columns to follow, teachers will tell you how they’re getting to “amazing” in this financially sustainable, scalable, teacher-loving initiative designed to help all students excel,” the Hassels write. Read the full column at The 74.

In the News: Opportunity Culture in Indianapolis, NC districts

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on February 17, 2017

Indianapolis is experimenting with a new kind of teacher — and it’s transforming this school: At School 107 in Indianapolis, Principal Jeremy Baugh said, “We needed to find a way to support new teachers to be highly effective right away.” Chalkbeat covers how Baugh and his staff began using Multi-Classroom Leadership this year to help their students. Historically a low-performing school, with high student and teacher turnover and a high number of English language learners, School 107 has already been able to keep one strong teacher in the classroom as an MCL instead of moving into administration, and with its team of MCLs could face an unexpected influx of 181 students who joined the school over the past few months. Read the full story here.

‘Opportunity Culture’ initiative coming to Vance County schools: Vance County Schools has become the fourth North Carolina district to participate in the national Opportunity Culture Initiative, reported The Daily Dispatch, with three elementary schools being the district’s first to implement their new teaching roles and school plans in the 2017-18 school year. Vance will be using multi-classroom leaders and expanded-impact teachers. Read the full story here.

Teacher leadership roles come to Edgecombe County: At Edgecombe County Public Schools, the first three of the district’s schools to embark on Opportunity Culture roles form a feeder pattern from elementary through high school, where, says Public Impact’s Shonaka Ellison,”we’re losing some really excellent teaching in schools.” As Liz Bell reports in EducationNC, Ellison is working closely with Edgecombe County administrators and teachers at the three schools to to plan new teaching roles and career paths aimed at recruiting and retaining great teachers. She led some of them on visits to Opportunity Culture schools in Charlotte, which also has challenges retaining teachers in high-needs schools–but Edgecombe, she notes, has the added challenge of being a rural district. “For a place like Edgecombe County, that’s really rural, having this type of career opportunity for teachers will help draw more teachers to the district,” she said. Read the full story here.

For more recent stories on Edgecombe, see December 2016 and January 2017 articles in The Rocky Mount Telegram: Edgecombe schools seek opportunities* and Edgecombe school district pursues new teacher recruitment plan.*

Scheduled for Success: Frank Zaremba of Barnette Elementary in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools writes: “When I became a multi-classroom leader for the exceptional children’s (EC’s) team, I expected to be able to use my 15 years of experience as an EC teacher and dean of students to coach teachers, especially special education teachers, and help them grow. But I quickly discovered that the people who needed support the most were the general classroom teachers who needed to know how to work with students with disabilities when an EC teacher couldn’t be in the room at the same time. What was the key to getting everyone on the same page and making terrific progress? Scheduling.” Read his inspiring column on what they did, and the impact on students, here in Real Clear Education.

*Articles are no longer available online.

Edgecombe County, NC, “Thrilled” to Join Opportunity Culture Initiative

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on January 11, 2017

To attract and retain great teachers, Edgecombe County Public Schools, located along the Tar River in flood-ravaged North Carolina, has joined the national Opportunity Culture initiative to extend the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for more pay, within recurring budgets. The initiative now includes 17 sites in seven states, including three others in North Carolina.

[Read more…]

ESSA Opportunities for Excellence: New Real Clear Ed Column

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on August 19, 2016

In a new column for Real Clear Education,Public Impact’s co-directors, Emily Ayscue Hassel and Bryan Hassel, highlight the opportunities through ESSA for state leaders to achieve excellence:

State and district leaders have a great new opportunity under the 2015 federal Every Student Succeeds Act: more flexibility in spending the funds they receive than in prior versions.

But let’s face it: Most states won’t seize this opportunity to strive for greater excellence in students’ learning. Even fewer are likely to do so in a way that really helps teachers and principals excel.

Too bad for the kids. Decades of reform and school improvement efforts, beginning long before 2001’s No Child Left Behind, strongly indicate that more freedom to spend federal funds is not enough. Achievement across socioeconomic levels was lower before NCLB’s strict directives than afterward. For example, just 8 to 13 percent of low-income students were proficient in reading or math on the National Assessment of Educational Progress in 2000, rising to 18 to 24 percent by 2015. Despite progress across income levels, though, achievement gaps remained intact and about 40 to 50 percent of economically advantaged U.S. students still were not proficient in basic academic skills by 2015.

Yet more jobs than ever will require post-secondary education and training, and job growth is high in STEM subjects, for which schools face some of the greatest teacher shortages. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projected that STEM occupations employment will grow by 10 percent from 2015 to 2025, compared with 6.5 percent growth for non-STEM occupations. Students need advanced coursework and strong thinking skills in all subjects. But entry into teaching preparation programs has fallen.

If state leaders want learning outcomes that truly prepare students for their future, they need a new approach. Instead of retreating to pre-NCLB terrain, leaders must use the lessons from NCLB to leap ahead to approaches that both work for students and feel great to educators. Among those lessons: a focus on good, solid teaching is not enough to propel the mass of students ahead of their beginnings, and reforms must help teachers improve and excel in their careers, while inspiring promising, new teachers to enter the profession.

Read their full column here, based on the new brief from Public Impact, ESSA: New Law, New Opportunity.

Speaking Up: A Year’s Worth of Opportunity Culture Voices

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on May 26, 2016

Real Clear Composite 1 SM“How many teachers are out there struggling daily because of lack of support?  How many burn out because they’ve tried all they know?  How many leave our profession early because they can’t do it on their own any longer? How many kids suffer because they have access to only one teacher? How many students are falling more and more behind because they have zero control over their educational trajectory?  We need a change; more important, our students deserve change.

“Opportunity is knocking on our traditional educational doors. The question is: Will we answer? Teachers, administrators, policymakers: It’s time. Open the door.”

That was Charlotte Multi-Classroom Leader (MCL) Kristin Cubbage, who kicked off the Opportunity Culture series on Real Clear Education a year ago and wrapped it up this month, extolling what made her advanced role so valuable, and calling for more Opportunity Culture roles. Indeed, the Opportunity Culture initiative has continued to spread.

Cubbage was part of the first cohort of Opportunity Culture Fellows—pioneering teachers in Opportunity Culture schools who stepped up to share their views nationally, and who wrote this series, with accompanying videos, explaining what Opportunity Culture models look like in their schools and what they think about these highly accountable positions:

[Read more…]

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