Public Impact News & Views

By Paola Gilliam To help Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders, their teaching teams, and other teachers lead student success, Public Impact has added to its suite of instructional excellence support. Our tools and professional development are based on experiences and feedback of top Opportunity Culture educators, as well as hard research. We provide a free, full set of tools on Instructional Leadership and Excellence to help educators master each element—free training, teaching team study guides, educator videos, and other help…

By Public Impact How has being a person of color affected the ways in which successful charter school leaders built schools where students, families, and staff learn, grow, and thrive? We profiled eight such leaders to find out, in a three-part series written by Public Impact’s Daniela Doyle, Juli Kim, Shonaka Ellison, and Ismael Hernandez-Cruz in partnership with the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. Identity and Charter School Leadership—Profiles of Leaders of Color: Building an Effective StaffEngaging FamiliesBuilding a Strong…

In September, Public Impact convened its Opportunity Culture Fellows for collaboration and learning, featuring sessions on tools to help educators personalize instruction, the science of reading, strategies of multi-classroom leaders and principals for team leadership and leading schoolwide change, and effective advocacy within schools and districts. On the Opportunity Culture blog, we are sharing some of what we learned in a series of blog posts. Check out the recent posts: Multi-classroom leader panel at the…

Districts are increasingly joining with external providers—often charter operators—to implement “restarts” as one way to turn around persistently struggling schools. In a restart, a school continues to serve the same community, while its new provider receives operational autonomy in exchange for a contractual commitment to raise student outcomes. Our ongoing research has documented more than 200 such restarts in 16 states between 2010–11 and 2016–17, as leaders seek alternatives to closing struggling schools or allowing…

In September, Public Impact convened its Opportunity Culture Fellows for a day of collaboration and learning which featured sessions on tools to help educators personalize instruction, the science of reading, multi-classroom leader & principal strategies for team leadership and leading schoolwide change, and effective advocacy within schools and districts. On the Opportunity Culture blog, we are sharing some of what we learned in a series of blog posts. Check out the first two: The Learner…

Read our vision brief: Excellent Teaching for Every Young Child: Opportunity Culture in Early Childhood Education What if far more children ages 0–5 who are in early childhood education and care settings had consistent access to excellent teaching? In these critical developmental years, young children—especially those who have fewer educational and developmental advantages outside of formal settings—need excellent teaching every year to fulfill their potential. When children lack access to high-quality early childhood development, they…

In general, virtual charter schools have had poor outcomes. A 2015 study from CREDO (the Center for Research on Education Outcomes) found that, on average, students enrolled in online charter schools lost 180 days of learning in math and 72 days of learning in reading compared to similar students in brick-and-mortar schools. But virtual schools have the potential to give students access to high-quality instruction regardless of time and place, and to allow students to…

In Better Together: Why Charter School Champions and Parent Advocates Should Partner to Better Support Students with Disabilities, Public Impact issues a call to action for charter champions—including charter associations, city-based education organizations and other reform organizations that see charters as an integral piece of a thriving system of public schools—to form and deepen partnerships with parent advocates to expand access to more quality educational options for students with disabilities. See coverage of this report…

Charter schools frequently confront inadequate facility funding, few affordable and suitable buildings, inadequate facility expertise among charter founders, and gradual expansion of enrollment and grade levels that requires more or new space. Charter school facility incubators provide affordable, short-term space for new and growing charter schools. In a new report, Charter School Facility Incubators: A Case Study of Washington, D.C.’s Innovative Approach to Charter School Facilities, Public Impact takes an in-depth look at the design…

Public Impact announces with pleasure our fifth cohort of Opportunity Culture Fellows. This year’s 15 fellows are Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders and principals who have achieved strong results and been leaders in their schools and districts. Fellows provide support to their cohort, take one another’s ideas back to their schools, write columns about their experiences, and speak locally and nationally about their Opportunity Culture roles. Their feedback and leadership are invaluable in helping to improve the Opportunity Culture…

Opportunity Culture schools and educators continue to attract attention…check out these posts from new sites, multi-classroom leader columns, and an exciting award for a multi-classroom leader. Lexington City Schools’ Superintendent on Working with Us to Implement Opportunity Culture: Dr. Anitra Wells, superintendent of Lexington City Schools, discusses the district’s plans to work with Public Impact to implement Opportunity Culture in the 2019-20 school year. Opportunity Culture will extend the reach of excellent teachers and their…

Opportunity Culture continues to grow: After an initial year at North Little Rock Middle School, the Arkansas Department of Education has expanded its Opportunity Culture pilot to three more districts. The school districts of Forrest City, Lead Hill, and Lincoln are joining the Opportunity Culture initiative—to which the state committed in its Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) plan—with plans to begin using Opportunity Culture roles in the 2019–20 school year. North Little Rock, now in its second…

By Hadley Moore In 2015–16, I was a high school English teacher at an elite, private college-prep high school. In 2017-18, I became an assistant principal at an inner-city elementary school. How on earth did that happen? I loved being a high school English teacher. It was my dream job, molding and shaping young people’s lives through literary works that made my heart sing. I could have quite happily remained ensconced in my classroom for…

As student learning continues to benefit, teachers want to keep and grow Opportunity Culture: That’s just one of the many findings and stats to report from the 2018-19 update of the Opportunity Culture data dashboard. Public Impact, which created and leads the national Opportunity Culture initiative, updates the dashboard annually. Highlights from the dashboard include: Schools—Opportunity Culture now has 302 schools committed. Opportunity Culture grew from seven schools implementing in 2013–14 to 151 schools in 2018–19….

By Amber Hines. This column first appeared on EducationNC. As soon as students enter my classroom for a small-group session, I know what question is coming: “Are we going to record?” Elementary school students love using technology. But teachers must use students’ valuable learning time wisely: Technology should be meaningful, data-driven, and help meet our learning goals. Our students are digital natives, so they’re confident with technology; it can give them the freedom to share…