Public Impact News & Views

An Opportunity Culture extends the reach of excellent teaching—what about doing the same for excellent schoolwide leadership? Public Impact, which founded the national Opportunity Culture initiative, today releases a set of practical materials on Multi-School Leadership: How to extend the reach of excellent principals by having them lead a small group of schools, for more pay, funded within the budgets of their schools. Multi-school leaders (MSLs) are excellent principals with a record of high-growth student…

Amid all the buzz about personalizing learning, what can we learn from schools getting great results? In Public Impact’s new report with the Clayton Christensen Institute, Innovative Staffing to Personalize Learning, we analyzed eight schools and school networks that are not only personalizing learning, but also getting strong learning results with disadvantaged students. What’s different about these schools compared with the norm? New staffing models combined with blended learning. In these schools, blended learning does…

What’s new with Opportunity Culture? Recent news coverage highlights the growth and successes of Opportunity Culture, an initiative of Public Impact: Jessica Smith (left) leads a teaching team as a multi-classroom leader in Indianapolis Public Schools. Guilford school board wants flexibility to help 9 low-performing schools: Jessie Pounds of the News & Record reported on the expansion of Opportunity Culture into nine schools in Greensboro, N.C., with the district planning for…

Under Superintendent Sharon Contreras, Guilford County Schools, based in Greensboro, N.C., has joined the national Opportunity Culture initiative to extend the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for more pay, within schools’ recurring budgets. Researchers at the Brookings Institution and American Institutes for Research released a study in January showing the effect Opportunity Culture can have: Teachers who were on average at the 50th percentile in student learning gains, and who…

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…

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%…

How can schools begin to address all their students’ individual learning needs? Blended learning is increasingly part of the answer schools consider—but what about a broader rethinking of how schools are organized and staffed? At Public Impact, we’ve been working with the Clayton Christensen Institute to take a close look at eight schools/school networks around the country using innovative staffing models to personalize learning—district, charter, and private schools. We’ve just published the first of two…

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…

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…

This column first appeared on EducationNC on February 7, 2018. I recently sat down to talk with my principal about why the multi-classroom leader role has proved so crucial when midyear turnover leaves a teaching team short, or with a long-term substitute. My journey in education began in 2009 when I joined Teach for America and was placed in Charlotte as a seventh-grade math teacher. In 2011, I left teaching to go to graduate school…

Multi-classroom leaders have been in the spotlight this week! In the News: The recent release of a study by the American Institutes for Research and the Brookings Institution highlights the power of multi-classroom leaders (MCLs). The team teachers studied, who were now on teams led by MCLs, were, on average, at the 50th percentile in the student learning gains they produced before joining an MCL team. After joining the teams, they produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers…

This column first appeared in Education Next on January 17, 2018. What if every student actually could have an excellent teacher? According to a new study released through the CALDER Center, it might be possible. Study authors Ben Backes of American Institutes for Research (AIR) and Michael Hansen of the Brookings Institution found that students in classrooms of team teachers led by Opportunity Culture “multi-classroom leaders” showed sizeable, statistically significant academic gains. There’s interesting fine print, so read on….

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…

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…

When Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders describe their jobs—providing intensive, on-the-job coaching, support for planning, and data analysis leadership to a team of teachers while continuing to teach students, too—they hear the same question: How do you fit all that in? See the answer in a new video and vignette from Public Impact: Days in the Life: The Work of a Successful Multi-Classroom Leader. These publications are useful for principals in Opportunity Culture schools, current multi-classroom…