Federal Teacher Quality Initiatives · In 2012-13, HQTs taught 97.65 percent of all core academic...

Inside the BeltwayOutside the Box

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Federal Teacher

Quality Initiatives

Outside the Box

Inside the Beltway

Joel Packer, Principal

[email protected]


Current Federal Programs• Highly Qualified Teacher (HQT) Requirement

• Improving Teacher Quality State Grants (ESEA

Title II)

• Teacher Quality Partnership Grants (HEA Title II)

• Teacher Incentive Fund

• Teacher and leader evaluation and support

systems

• State Educator Equity Plans

• Supporting Effective Educator Development

(SEED)

• Commit To Lead

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Highly Qualified Teacher (HQT)

Requirement

Under NCLB, each State receiving Title I

funding had to have a plan to ensure that,

by the end of the 2005-2006 school year,

all teachers teaching in core academic

subjects within the state be designated a

highly qualified teacher.

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Requirement• The definition of an HQT has two basic

components.

– First, a teacher must possess full state teaching

certification as well as a baccalaureate degree.

• Exemption allows through the 2015-16 school

year, teachers participating in alternative

certification programs to be considered "highly

qualified" prior to completing their program.

– Second, is that an HQT must demonstrate

subject-matter knowledge in the areas that she

or he teaches.

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Requirement

In 2012-13, HQTs taught 97.65

percent of all core academic classes

in elementary schools and 95.69

percent in secondary schools.

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Improving Teacher Quality

State Grants• Created by NCLB - formula program to States

– States distribute 95% of funds to school districts

– Current funding = $2.35 billion

• Allowable uses of funds:

– Recruiting and retaining highly qualified teachers

and principals;

– Professional development in core academic areas;

– Mentoring, induction, and other support services;

– Testing teachers in academic areas; and

– Reducing class size

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Improving Teacher Quality

State Grants

• Majority of funds in 2012-2013 were used for

class size reduction (31%) and professional

development (44%).

• 64 percent of districts allocate at least some

funds for professional development for teachers

and paraprofessionals. 47 percent of districts also

use funds to hire highly qualified teachers to

reduce class size.

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Teacher Quality

Partnership Grants • Authorized in the Higher Education Act,

program provides grants to improve the quality

of teachers working in high-need schools and

early childhood education programs by:

– improving the preparation of teachers and

enhancing professional development activities for

teachers;

– holding teacher preparation programs accountable

for preparing effective teachers; and

– recruiting highly qualified individuals into the

teaching force.

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Teacher Quality

Partnership Grants • Grants go to partnerships among IHEs, high-

need school districts, their high-need schools,

and/or high-need early childhood education

programs.

• These partnerships create model teacher

preparation programs at the pre-

baccalaureate level and/or model teaching

residency programs for individuals with strong

academic and/or professional backgrounds

but without teaching experience.

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Teacher Quality

Partnership Grants

• FY 2014 funding = $40.6 million.

• This year's TQP grants were announced

last week and focus on preparing STEM

teachers, and increasing the participation

of underrepresented groups—women,

minorities and people with disabilities—in

teaching STEM subjects.

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Teacher Preparation

Regulations• New proposed regulations expected in

next few weeks. The Administration’s plan

is expected to:

– Encourage all states to develop systems to

identify high- and low-performing teacher

prep programs.

– Ask states to move away from current

input-focused reporting requirements,

incorporate more meaningful outcomes,

and improve the availability of relevant

information on teacher preparation.11/11/09 11


Teacher Preparation

Regulations

– Rely on state-developed program ratings of

preparation programs – in part – to determine

program eligibility for TEACH grants, which are

available to students who are planning to

become teachers in a high-need field in a low-

income school, to “ensure that these limited

federal dollars support high-quality teacher

education and preparation”.

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Teacher Preparation

Regulations• The goal: To ensure that every state evaluates

its teacher education programs by several key

metrics, such as how many graduates land

teaching jobs, how long they stay in the

profession and whether they boost their

students’ scores on standardized tests.

• The administration hopes to steer financial aid,

including nearly $100 million a year in TEACH

grants, to those programs that score the

highest.

• The rest, Sec. Duncan said, will need to

improve or “go out of business.”

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Teacher Incentive Fund

• Exists solely through appropriations

process. First funded in FY 2006.

• Competitive 5-year grants to SEAs, LEAS

and eligible non-profits to support efforts

to develop and implement performance-

based teacher and principal compensation

systems in high-need schools that raise

student achievement and close

achievement gaps.

• Currently funded at $289 million.

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Teacher and Leader Evaluation

• Key Debate now is teacher

effectiveness versus teacher quality.

• Race To The Top grants defined an

“effective teacher” as:

– a teacher whose students achieve acceptable

rates (e.g., at least one grade level in an

academic year) of student growth. States, LEAs,

or schools must include multiple measures,

provided that teacher effectiveness is evaluated,

in significant part, by student growth.

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• ED established five requirements for

teacher evaluation systems:– Teachers must be evaluated at least annually,

– Evaluation procedures must include several

classroom observations,

– Teacher performance must be measured in significant

part on growth in student achievement,

– Systems of evaluation must differentiate teachers

among multiple categories of effectiveness, and

– The results of teacher evaluations must inform

important school staffing decisions (e.g., promotion

and dismissal).

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• ESEA/NCLB waivers exempt states and school

districts from HQT requirements.

• In return, ED required that States and school

districts commit to develop, adopt, pilot, and

implement teacher and principal evaluation and

support systems that:

– will be used for continual improvement of

instruction;

– meaningfully differentiate performance using at

least three performance levels;

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– use multiple valid measures in determining

performance levels, including as a significant factor

data on student growth for all students (including

English Learners and students with disabilities),

and other measures of professional practice;

– evaluate teachers and principals on a regular

basis;

– provide clear, timely, and useful feedback,

including feedback that identifies needs and guides

professional development; and

– will be used to inform personnel decisions.

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• This summer, ED announced that States with ESEA

waivers can request a one-year delay until the 2015-

16 school year in the deadline for using student test

results in teacher evaluations.

• Change was based on issues with transition to

Common Core aligned assessments.

• According to ED Week, 16 states and DC are likely to

ask for the new flexibility (AL, AR, CT, DE, GA, ID, KS,

MD, MI, MS, MO, OH, OR, RI, SD, and UT).

• At least 11 States say they aren't likely to seek the

extra time, including AZ, CO, FL, KY, MA, MN, NM,

NY, NC, PA, TN, and VA.

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State Educator Equity Plans

• NCLB requires that highly-qualified teachers

be equitably distributed among classrooms

and schools.

• In August 2013, ED announced that States

with waivers must, by October 2015, use

teacher-evaluation data to ensure that poor

and minority students are not taught by

ineffective teachers at a higher rate than their

peers.

• But in November 2013, ED dropped that as a

requirement for ESEA waiver renewals.

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• In July of this year, ED instead announced

that in April 2015, each SEA (regardless of

waiver status) must submit to the Department

a new State Educator Equity Plan that

describes the steps it will take to ensure that

“poor and minority children are not taught at

higher rates than other children by

inexperienced, unqualified, or out-of-field

teachers”.

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• The Obama administration plans to develop a

new, $4.2 million "technical assistance"

network—called the Educator Equity Support

Network—to help states develop their plans

and put them in place.

• The network will come up with model plans to

guide states' work, and give educators a

space to share information about how they

have approached the teacher-equity problem.

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Supporting Effective

Educator Development • Provides funding for grants to national non-

profit organizations for projects that are

supported by at least moderate evidence to

recruit, select, and prepare or provide

professional enhancement activities for

teachers, principals, or both.

• Funded as a set-aside from Teacher Quality

State Grants ($29.8 million in FY 2013).

– 2013 Awardees: National Institute for Excellence in

Teaching, Teach For America, WestEd, National

Writing Project and National Board for Professional

Teaching Standards

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Commit to Lead

• In August, ED and the National Board for

Professional Teaching Standards unveiled

Commit to Lead, “a new online community

that makes it easy for educators to share

ideas for teacher leadership and collaborate

to bring these ideas to fruition.”

• Invites members to post ideas—in under 300

words—that advance teacher leadership in

their school, district or state to address a

pressing problem in education and improve

student outcomes.

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Federal Teacher Quality Initiatives · In 2012-13, HQTs taught 97.65 percent of all core academic...

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