CTQ President Barnett Berry and Renee Moore, part of the Teacher Leaders Network and the TeacherSolutions 2030 team, have published "The Teachers of 2030" in May's issue of Educational Leadership (log in is required to read the full text). This edition of the journal focuses on "the key to changing the teaching profession." Berry and Moore share the voices of the TeacherSolutions 2030 team, offering a compelling glimpse into the forces shaping the future of education - and the lead teachers will take in preparing students and schools for a successful future. If you're thinking that's a topic worthy of a whole book, you won't be disappointed. The Teachers of 2030 is forthcoming from Teachers College Press, offering an extended look at the future of teaching and learning - and starting a conversation about how we get where we need to go.

Often times the debates over teaching quality tailspin into either/or propositions: Paying teachers for any year of experience and credential versus paying them for producing higher student achievement scores on once-a-year standardized tests. In Florida this debate is very hot. Education Policy Council Chair Will Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel has claimed that “We have so many great teachers in the state of Florida and we've got to find creative ways to reward them." Unfortunately the proposed legislation looks like many failed merit pay plans of the past – penalizing school districts that do not toss aside their current salary schedules and pay teachers for test score gains.....

On April 5, 2010, Barnett Berry testified before the Florida House Education Policy Council about a bill that proposes changes to teachers' contracts, including a performance pay measure that has drawn criticism for its narrow reliance on standardized tests as the sole measure of student achievement. You can read a news article about the hearing and view Barnett Berry's presentation slides.

The Professional Educator Standards Board of Washington State held their first meeting of the year this week. On March 24, Barnett Berry led a panel via conference call from Denver, CO (where power thankfully stayed connected during a sudden snow storm). Berry discussed the urban teacher residency (UTR) model and its implications for teacher preparation. You can view his presentation slides to learn about several current UTR programs and their components.

In a survey recently conducted by Teachers Network, 90 percent of over 1200 teachers surveyed reported that participating in a network improved their teaching. More than three quarters of them reported that their network participation improved their school overall. 94 percent reported gaining new knowledge and skills through their collaborative participation. In addition to improving teaching and learning, 79 percent of participants also felt that their participation was a catalyst for staying in the classroom.

CTQ draws on the Teachers Network survey and other research, including their own case studies, in the newly published report A Better System for Schools: Developing, Supporting and Retaining Effective Teachers. The report surfaces the compelling influence that peer support can have on teacher retention and effectiveness. CTQ President Barnett Berry commented, "The evidence from growing research and this recent survey points clearly to the power of teacher collaboration for teaching effectiveness and improving student achievement. Now it is time for policymakers to use the evidence to think carefully and act boldly in designing a 21st century, results-oriented profession."

While collaboration and leadership opportunities should be built systemically, thriving initiatives already exist and show their promise. Teachers Network serves over 21 affiliates who have adopted programs such as TeachNet and the New Teacher Resource Program. These programs operate on the same belief as the CTQ-managed virtual learning community, the Teacher Leaders Network: We must move beyond the isolating egg carton structure of school culture, and it starts with connecting teachers for leading and learning.

Collaboration and leadership opportunities both keep accomplished teachers in the profession and have the potential to leverage their expertise across a school. CTQ's analysis surfaces several schoolwide practices that will promote effective teaching. These include:

(1) principals who cultivate and embrace teacher leadership;
(2) time and tools for teachers to learn from each other;
(3) opportunities for teachers to connect and work with community organizations and agencies that support students and their families outside the school walls;
(4) evaluation systems that comprehensively measure the impact of teachers on student learning; and
(5) performance pay systems that primarily reward the spread of teaching expertise and spur collaboration among teachers.

Several policy briefs by Barnett Berry, Alesha Daughtrey and Alan Wieder of the Center for Teaching Quality, as well as Ken Futernick of West Ed, accompany the research report.

Parents have always understood something that has become increasingly clear to policymakers: the quality of the teacher has the biggest impact of any school-based factor on a child's learning. What is less understood is what conditions impact a teacher's effectiveness. What qualities in a teacher's background and preparation translate into student achievement gains? And once a teacher is teaching, what helps them to teach better?

To parse some of these questions, the Economic Policy Institute recently asked the Center for Teaching Quality to investigate what's known about the impact of various conditions on teaching quality. The resulting policy brief, Teaching Effectiveness and The Conditions That Matter Most in High-Needs Schools, is authored by Barnett Berry, CTQ President; Alesha Daughtrey, Research and Policy Associate, and Alan Wieder, Senior Research Consultant.

The trio re-examines the established research and uses case studies from their investigations into teacher working conditions to home in on significant, but lesser known, findings. For example, while the traditional wisdom is that a teacher's academic ability does contribute to student achievement, the impact is small when compared to factors like preparation. And the impact of preparation doesn't come down to alternative vs. traditional pathways, but the quality of individual factors within any program of preparation. Opportunities to engage in the actual practice of teaching and congruence between the student teaching experience and actual first-year teaching assignment are elements of preparation programs that yield high student achievement gains. For teachers who teach in high-needs schools, specific preparation for those schools contributes significantly toward their success.

Once a teacher is placed in a school, further conditions shape their potential to teach successfully. One key finding in the policy brief is that research that measures the impact of a teacher's experience singly cannot encompass the effect of teacher experience collectively. When experiences and strengths are used strategically in a team of teachers, support is given and expertise spread. Research must drill further into clarifying the effect of the composition of teachers' skills and experience within a team or school.

CTQ's newest TeacherSolutions team, focused on teacher working conditions (TWC), is hard at work investigating the latest research and finding ways to use working conditions data to improve policy decisions. Their conclusions will deepen our understanding of what it takes to give all students access to high quality, efficacious teaching - when the condition of their school is not an obstacle.