Public Impact

Innovation. Excellence. Service. Impact.

Personalizing Learning with Innovative Staffing + Blended Learning: 4 New School Profiles

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As part of a deep look at how schools rethink how they are organized to address each student’s needs, Public Impact and the Clayton Christensen Institute today released the second set of profiles of schools and teachers using innovative staffing with blended learning. These profiles, many with accompanying videos, set the stage for an upcoming white paper analyzing the patterns of the schools’ and teachers’ experiences.

We focused on schools or school networks serving disadvantaged populations that achieved better-than-typical student learning and provided students with more personalized experiences while using new staffing models and blended learning.

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Finding Inspiration Again Through Teacher Leadership

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This column first appeared on EducationNC on February 23, 2018.

As a young child I was always taught the famous proverb: If you love your job, you will never work a day in your life. I discovered my passion in education—my love for learning and teaching. So I have truly never “worked” since I was 21 years old. As I matured, though, I realized that we all need continued inspiration to keep pushing toward the goal of creating successful students.

After 11 years of teaching, I began to feel complacent. I knew the lessons. I knew the students. I knew the building. I knew the staff. My passion was dwindling. I needed to reach out and change lives in a different way.

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Analysis: New Study Finds Huge Student Learning Gains in Schools Where Teachers Mentor Their Colleagues as Multi-Classroom Leaders

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This column was first published on The 74 on February 13, 2018.

In survey after survey, teachers report dissatisfaction with the professional development they receive. Many aren’t satisfied with their professional learning communities or coaching opportunities. Teachers say they want more on-the-job development, career advancement while teaching, and collaboration time.

Some teachers are getting what they want. But is that good news for students? Do their students learn more?

According to a new study released through the CALDER Center, the answer is yes — a lot more. Authors Ben Backes of American Institutes for Research and Michael Hansen of the Brookings Institution found that students of teachers who receive these types of supports from multi-classroom leaders in Public Impact’s Opportunity Culture initiative showed sizable, statistically significant academic gains.

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Brookings-AIR Study Finds Large Academic Gains in Opportunity Culture

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Students in classrooms of team teachers led by “multi-classroom leaders” showed sizeable academic gains, according to a new study from the American Institutes for Research and the Brookings Institution.

Students respond to a multi-classroom leader’s question in a classroom in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools.

The team teachers were, on average, at the 50th percentile in the student learning gains they produced before joining a team led by a multi-classroom leader. After joining the teams, they produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers in the top quartile in math and nearly that in reading, said the report, released on January 11, 2018, through the CALDER Center.

The gains the study attributes to team teachers are 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.

These results show that students can consistently experience top-quartile teaching in math, and teaching nearly that good in reading, if schools place excellent teachers in charge of small teams of typical teachers.

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Beyoncé and Teacher Pay: TEDx Talk Tells All!

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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.

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Opportunity Culture Voices: How My West Texas School Elevated Struggling Young Readers (and Their Teachers)

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For years, my school, Washington Elementary in Big Spring, Texas, struggled to meet all our students’ literacy needs. We group students in tiers, as in the “Response to Intervention” model, but each year we were still left with extremely large groups in Tier II and Tier III — struggling students and chronically struggling students. Each year, we tried to reinvent the wheel to increase our student success, but to no avail — until last year.

Most of Washington’s students come from low socioeconomic status households. Several have grandparents or someone other than parents raising them, several come to school hungry and dirty, many have parents who work multiple jobs and cannot help with homework, and quite a few have at least one parent in prison. When small children are forced to deal with situations like these, school often takes a back seat. Nevertheless, my coworkers and I must make sure they receive a quality education.

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Opportunity Culture Voices: When Students Own Their Academic Results, They Transform Their Schools

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When you’re not sure where to start, ask your students! Well, not always, but when I came to Charlotte, North Carolina’s James Martin Middle School as a multi-classroom leader in 2014, I felt overwhelmed.

I started as the MCL for sixth grade, where for the previous three years the students had been experiencing negative learning growth — falling further and further behind. By my second year, my teaching team’s students exceeded the state’s expected growth targets in literacy and achieved double-digit growth in overall proficiency.

How did we accomplish this? We began by surveying our students about their interests, trying to learn what motivates them and how to better serve their needs.

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Public Impact®

Chapel Hill, NC
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New from Public Impact

Employment Opportunities—Join the growing Public Impact team!
We are hiring entry- and mid-level consultants, entry-level research analysts, a media and communications assistant, and a writer. Smart, driven candidates committed to excellence please apply! Deadline October 22, 2018.

Closing Achievement Gaps—In Diverse and Low-Poverty Schools
Report commissioned by Oak Foundation proposes a fresh, complete package of approaches to closing achievement gaps in diverse schools.

Design for Impact—Teacher Residencies that Last
Report provides actionable guidance for designing financially sustainable teacher residency programs.

Innovative Staffing to Personalize Learning—New Teaching Roles + Blended Learning
New report analyzes eight schools and school networks that are not only personalizing learning, but also getting learning results with disadvantaged students.

Partnership for LA Schools—Slow & Steady Wins the Race
Report examines the Partnership’s in-district turnaround model and its impact on student achievement.