Today the Obama administration announced a new plan to create a corps of master teachers with the goal of improving education in high-need subject areas. The plan would cost $1 billion and would focus specifically on math and science teachers. These master teachers will receive a yearly stipend of $20,000 in exchange for several years commitment to the program. The program aims to have 10,000 teachers in the Master Teacher Corps within four years. Master Teacher Corps hopes to encourage science and math education by providing incentives for high-performing teachers and equipping them with additional tools and knowledge to share with their colleagues.
While Obama's plan is specifically geared toward encouraging science and math, it made me think of the Baltimore City tracks for "master" or "lead" teachers, where high-performing teachers can earn almost $100,000. Reading about plans like Obama's and seeing some increase of reforms based around merit-pay for teachers make me really encouraged, especially after our class discussion on teacher retention and recruitment.
Closing the achievement gap will never be possible without high-quality teachers in every urban classroom (although we know defining 'high-quality' is a whole other subject of its own). One reason schools like KIPP are so successful is because their teachers are essentially self-selected to share a certain mindset and a work-ethic. Great teachers flock to schools like KIPP because it is a chance for them to have the support and incentive to perform at the peak of their craft. Why can't public schools offer this same appeal? Unfortunately, teaching does not usually have the same draw as law, medicine or business - which is typically where top talent ends up. Creating corps of "master teachers" and offering high salaries for top-achievers is a great step in attracting more talent into the realm of teaching and giving them the incentive (and hopefully the support) to perform.
I hope there continues to be more programs like the one Obama is proposing and I hope Baltimore City continues to use merit pay and reward high-performing teachers. If we are going to attract the best teachers to our cause (and get them to stick around), we need to create a professional system that appeals to the top talent in our country.
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4 comments:
I agree, Rudi, I think it's great that Obama is dedicating a plan-and money- to keeping good teachers in the profession and giving them incentives to be leaders in their schools. If we are to value education, we must hold teachers in the highest esteem.
However, I of course am bothered that the incentive is only for science and math teachers. Since when have these become the most important subjects? The achievement gap, I believe, is a literacy gap. If we are to push for a better education for our students, we should also have incentives for early childhood, elementary, English, and social studies teachers.
In order to keep good teachers in the classroom we need more than just financial incentives, we need strong administrators. I wonder what needs to be done in order to change the focus from recruiting master teachers to recruiting master principals who can help to build entire school buildings filled with leaders? With strong administration comes the retention of strong classroom educators, thus creating a school of master teachers.
What is it about these "Master Teachers" that makes them so successful? Is it their mindset? Was it the leadership under which they first taught? Identifying 10,000 Master Teachers nation wide can be an excellent first step to comparing and isolating the factors that led these teachers to success. While I agree with Rachel that financial incentives are not the ultimate solution to teacher turnover, I believe they are a short-term measure that should be used until we are better able to understand what goes in to making a teacher succeed.
I, too, saw a brief mention of this on the news early last week and was intrigued by what this program had to offer to educators and students. Although people have quickly reacted to this initiative, the program is still in the very early stages of development, which makes it, at this point, very difficult, if not impossible, to form a well-informed opinion on the matter.
Until we know more details, I think we must consider that we are potentially removing highly efficient teachers from the classroom. If these Master Teachers are able to help educators across the country in meaningful ways, then this will be worth it; however, if the program flops, then a few hundred students lost out on a valuable opportunity to have a higher-quality teacher.
The selection process is also an interesting conversation to consider. Deciding how effective a teacher is based on his or her test scores is less subjective and more time- and cost-efficient. However, a teacher can produce high test scores but fail to provide his or her students with a meaningful education that sparks student interest and forces them to learn and use higher-order thinking skills. In order for the U.S. to produce a student body that can compete globally in terms of math and science, our students need to be able to think outside of the box. Therefore, this program needs to consider a selection process in which they are sure that they have found teachers who recognize that teaching to the test will only produce students who can recite the facts, but often do not know how to apply them to the real-world (and is that a meaningful education?). This means the selection process will be more subjective, with greater time, effort, and manpower necessary to make each selection. The program needs teachers who not only are comfortable with the curriculum, but also can engage students (while still, perhaps, producing admirable test scores). Furthermore, these teachers need to be able to demonstrate how to engage students in a variety of different settings; schools across the country vary in a number of ways, including students’ prior knowledge of the subject, access to resources and experience outside of the classroom, and how many materials and resources are available in the science and math classrooms. These teachers will have to demonstrate that they can produce success no matter what restrictions and challenges they face.
However, I believe there is something to be said about creating such an incentive program. This program acknowledges that good teachers deserve recognition and increased payments. Furthermore, the program could produce productive competition among educators. In our current system, it seems the driving force for many teachers is the fear of losing their job as a result of student performance on standardized tests; this fear is not enough to drive teachers to improve their craft in a productive way, rather, it encourages cheating and teaching to the test. In contrast, this program could motivate teachers to improve how well they engage their students and encourage higher-order thinking. Furthermore, unlike most careers, teachers do not have promotion opportunities to work towards (unless aspiring to be an administrator). In many industries, the potential opportunity for a promotion provides the necessary incentive for employees to work harder and put forth their best effort. In the education system, teachers do not have the same built-in incentive; therefore, it is important to provide opportunities for educators to aspire towards enhancing the quality of their craft.
I think it will be interesting to see how the plan develops in the coming months and how politicians, educators, and the public will respond to this new initiative.
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