Developing Charter School Teacher Leaders: The Career Progression of Teachers

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Developing Charter School Teacher Leaders: The Career Progression of Teachers

In the wake of federal grant-making initiatives such as Race to the Top, Investing in Innovation, and the Teacher Incentive Fund , national policymakers are encouraging educators to think creatively about how to maximize teachers' skills to improve student achievement and school administration. This month's newsletter feature provides context and tips about a more expansive approach to faculty career ladders, examples of programs at a charter school, and resources and references to further pursue the issues. Charter schools have a critical need and offer a clear opportunity for innovation in human capital management. They generally serve at-risk, high-need student populations, typically with fewer resources than district public schools. However, when school principals are allowed to freely make hiring and staffing decisions without district constraints, there is more room for creative approaches to foster the talents and leadership potential of teachers.

Expanding the Field for Teacher Development

Teachers say that one of their chief desires is career expansion, according to the 2009 Retaining Teacher Talent study, conducted by Public Agenda and Learning Point Associates. The study asked teachers around the country to reflect on the working conditions and career opportunities needed to keep them in the profession. Rather than settling for the single role of  "classroom teacher," today's practitioners are looking for other options to pique their interests and serve their particular skills.

A variety of strategies already are in play to increase the effectiveness and productivity of teachers in ways that also draw on their expert skills and knowledge. For example, team-teaching models can improve teacher effectiveness by increasing teacher job satisfaction, parent contact, and student engagement. By sharing the workload, teachers can spend more time interacting with students and their families. Professional learning communities also can have a similar impact. According to an article in the journal Issues...About Change , a publication disseminated by SEDL, professional learning communities can improve teacher effectiveness by creating a way for teachers to plan together and share strategies for both delivering instruction and managing student behavior. Another strategy is use of alternative compensation systems. Although alternative compensation methods are still controversial in terms of their design and implementation, studies discussed in the  TAP Research Summary 2011 have shown that alternative compensation can bolster teacher recruitment and encourage retention. These models can take many forms, such bonus pay to reward increased student achievement or incentive pay to attract and retain high-quality teachers--particularly in hard-to-staff subjects such as mathematics, science, and special education.

Responding to this trend, several states and school districts have initiated systems of differentiated staffing. According to the Learning Point Associates publication Toward the Structural Transformation of Schools: Innovations in Staffing , schools with differentiated staffing organize teachers into teams and differentiate each teacher's role according to his or her skill and expertise, the demands of the curriculum, and the needs of the students.

Teacher leadership in charter schools also might take the following forms:

  • Teachers can work in cohorts with a trained "lead teacher" to coplan, codesign, and collaborate on decisions based on data on each student's academic performance.
  • Staffing systems can be expanded and differentiated so that teachers specialize within faculties; some with a natural predilection for leadership would fill those roles, while others with subject expertise would teach what they know best.
  • Teacher leaders in these innovative charter schools would be compensated for their skills and professional knowledge with extra planning time or bonus pay.

The strategies outlined here require an upheaval in the way that school staffing grids have been traditionally organized. Strong, visionary leadership at every level is crucial to success. The good news is that innovative charter school principals nationwide have already initiated many of these changes.

Teachers Represent an Untapped Source of Leaders

Teacher leaders can exist in both formal and informal capacities within a school. According to Teacher Leadership That Strengthens Professional Practice, Charlotte Danielson describes informal teacher leaders as those faculty members who do the following:

  • Take initiative among faculty members.
  • Mobilize people for a common purpose.
  • Monitor the progress of other teachers.
  • Act as a liaison between faculty and the administration.
  • Share their knowledge and skills with others.

Formal teacher leaders have a more operationalized role in school mentoring, leadership, and decision making. Most important, by providing teachers with leadership opportunities, teachers become engaged in their own professional development, and a strong, collaborative working environment is born.

Building such opportunities for teacher leadership requires strong principals who cultivate talent at all levels. According to a 2009 report from the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University titled Teachers' Perceptions of Their Working Conditions: How Predictive Are Policy-Relevant Outcomes?, administrative support is significantly related to teacher departure rates, and these rates are correlated with student achievement. Therefore, strong leadership is critical to the success of both students and teachers. Strong building-level leadership improves all aspects of teacher working conditions, including staff collegiality, team spirit, community involvement, and even the physical features of the schoolhouse. Thus, the first step in promoting teacher leadership in a charter school community must begin with the principal and other school leaders.

Teacher Leaders in Charter Schools: One Approach in a Promising Network

One charter school network at the forefront of promoting teacher leadership and diverse career trajectories for teachers is Achievement First. This network of public charter schools began in 1998 in New Haven, Connecticut, and has expanded to 19 academies in four cities. According to its mission statement, Achievement First was founded "to prove that urban students can achieve at the same high levels as their suburban peers." All of the network's teachers are encouraged to take their careers into their own hands and work to hone their teaching craft. In fact, allowing teachers to grow professionally while working in a collaborative environment focused on improved student success is part of the network's mission.

"Every member of the Achievement First family (including all teachers, school leaders, operations and network team members) meets regularly with their manager or a coach to discuss areas of strength, areas for learning and to identify opportunities to stretch their skills," notes the network's website. "Our belief is that we can always do better, and we support our team members to do so." 

At Achievement First schools, formal teacher leaders work with their colleagues to improve practice across the board. Teachers meet with their coaches at least once every two weeks to work on planning, data-driven decision making, and their personally driven professional development. Implicit in this context is the opportunity for teachers to become those managers and coaches. 

In March 2011, the Aspen Institute Education & Society Program released Achievement First: Developing a Teacher Performance Management System That Recognizes Excellence. The report gives a detailed description of the network's system for managing teachers, includes the school's professional growth plan, and outlines the stages of teacher career development, including salary ranges. It describes the structural transformation that has taken place at Achievement First and the ways in which both forming professional learning communities and allowing them to flourish has allowed for greater teacher job satisfaction and student growth.

News

Tax-Exempt Bond Market for Charters Gains Strength, Study Says

Charter schools are making more extensive use of tax-exempt bonds to finance facilities but are still paying "significantly higher" interest rates on debt than school districts, even as they demonstrate growing strength as borrowers, according to a new study.

The Charter School Bond Issuance: A Complete History, prepared by the Local Initiatives Support Corporation, reports on charter school tax-exempt bond transactions completed during the past 13 years. It provides detailed information about 478 rated and unrated bonds totaling more than $5 billion and involving 400 charter schools. Read more.

Charter School on Joint Base Andrews Expects to Open in August

Imagine Andrews Public Charter School, the charter school being started on Joint Base Andrews in Prince Georges County, Maryland, expects to open August 22, 2011.

About 260 students have been selected for the school, which will open as a K-4 school; grades will be added each year through Grade 8, according to Pat Crain, Maryland Regional Director for Imagine Schools. Read more.

Former President Clinton Among Honorees at 2011 National Charter Schools Conference

The 2011 National Charter Schools Conference, held June 20-23, drew about 4,000 people to the Georgia World Congress Center in downtown Atlanta for wide-ranging discussions about key topics impacting charter schools, keynote addresses that included a speech by former President Bill Clinton, and the induction of new members of the Hall of Fame. Read more.

Tennis Star Agassi, Los Angeles Capital Group Launch $500 Million Charter Facilities Fund

A Los Angeles capital group and tennis champion and charter school founder Andre Agassi have formed a for-profit investment partnership to develop more than $500 million in facilities for top charter school operators across the country, according to partnership and news media accounts.

On June 2, 2011, Canyon Capital Realty Advisors and Andre Agassi Ventures announced the Canyon-Agassi Charter School Facilities Fund, with the goal of aiding the development of more than 75 urban school sites and new space for 40,000 students during the next 3-4 years. A Knowledge Is Power Program K-4 school in North Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, set to open in August 2011, is the fund's first campus. Read more.

U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs Hearing Notes Role of Charter Schools in Culture-Based Education

The role of charter schools was highlighted in a U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs hearing titled "In Our Way: Expanding the Success of Native Language & Culture-Based Education." The May 26, 2011, hearing in Washington, D.C., included testimony from Alvin Parker, Principal of Ka Waihona o ka Na`auao Public Charter School in Waianae, Hawaii. Parker's testimony addressed the start-up of the school in an "educationally altered chicken coop" on the western side of Oahu to its current K-8 program on a traditional school campus. The testimony included information about performance, the cultural education focus, instructional staff, professional development, and partnerships. Read more.

Events

August 1-3: The Office of Special Education Programs of the U.S. Department of Education will hold its 2011 Leadership Mega Conference in Crystal City, Virginia, located just outside Washington, D.C. A wide range of sessions is planned to increase opportunities for collaboration and networking. Online registration is now available.

October 24-27: The National Association of Charter School Authorizers will host its 2011 Leadership Conference on Amelia Island, near Jacksonville, Florida.

Resources