NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND: "HIGHLY QUALIFIED" TEACHERS

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) holds the promise to be a welcomed impetus for closing the achievement gap in schools where poor and minority children are most likely to have the least prepared teachers. Unfortunately, our own research in four states, 12 districts and 24 high-need schools indicates that the laudable intent of NCLB’s provisions for providing highly qualified teachers has been severely compromised and the law’s promise remains unfulfilled.

After speaking with more than 160 educators and surveying hundreds of teachers, CTQ researchers recognize three primary findings most essential to address if the law is to help ensure not only a highly qualified teacher, but also a high quality teacher for all students.

“Highly Qualified” Does Not Ensure High Quality: Under NCLB, teachers are considered “highly qualified” if they meet specific requirements. These requirements, however, focus only on what teachers know, not what they are able to do. Educators consistently reported that successful teachers have both content knowledge and instructional skills, such as knowing how to address different students’ learning needs and skill levels in the classroom.

Hard-to-Staff Solutions Are Hard to Find: The current crisis in recruiting and retaining teachers relates less to overall supply and more to regional and local inequalities. While some districts appear well on their way to meeting the 100 percent highly qualified teacher requirements, these well-resourced communities sometimes obscure the pervasive recruitment and retention challenges faced by hard-to-staff schools and districts. Leaders in urban and rural districts struggled, even with additional funds, to compete in the teacher labor market. What’s more, few schools went beyond signing bonuses to more comprehensive approaches to recruit teachers, including better working conditions and long-term support for teachers.

Same Approaches Will Lead to the Same Results: Most of the schools and districts we visited have not changed their recruitment or professional development practices since NCLB was passed. “Business as usual” occurred for several reasons. Antiquated data systems and ever changing definitions of highly qualified teachers have consumed district personnel. Districts, particularly in smaller rural areas, lack the capacity to recruit and provide ongoing support to teachers. Models for successfully changing recruitment or professional development practices are limited, and even when examples of success are shared, the on the ground assistance to customize them to meet the specific needs of districts is not available.

To read the complete set of SECTQ recommendations for the federal government, states and districts to improve the application of NCLB so that students will have not only a highly qualified, but also a high quality teacher in every classroom, every day, read the published report.