Videos:
Increasing teacher and teaching effectiveness is a paramount challenge facing public education. But what strategies work and are cost effective?
Do we achieve an effective teacher workforce through intensive supports to help teachers improve their performance? If so, are there sources of effective teacher professional development and training from which states and districts can choose? Despite major investments in professional development from federal, state, and local sources, research shows that most professional development in current use is ineffective. Meanwhile, improvements are underway in the quality of teacher evaluations to inform personnel decisions necessary to not only remove low-performing teachers, but also to provide teachers with feedback about their performance and ways of improving. Developing new teacher-performance systems is complicated and requires new capabilities at the school and district levels, as well as new policies to support these reforms.
Join us for an extended conversation involving two panels of leading thinkers on proven solutions that improve teacher and teaching effectiveness, and evaluation issues that are unique to high school teacher improvement.
We will begin the first panel with a presentation by Craig Jerald about the current debate on the purposes and policy drivers of teacher evaluation. We will then hear from Robert Pianta, who will discuss a new paper on evidence-supported approaches to professional development. The second panel will focus on designing evaluation systems for high school teachers, addressing challenges that arise at the high school level, and discussing solutions. This panel will feature a new paper by John H. Tyler. For both panels, we will be joined by distinguished representatives from the front line—school districts, teacher unions, and educators—working to implement teacher-performance systems to improve teacher effectiveness and student achievement.
Featured presenters:
Craig Jerald, President, Break the Curve Consulting
Robert Pianta, Dean, Curry School of Education, and Director, University of Virginia Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning
John H. Tyler, Associate Professor of Education, Economics, and Public Policy, Brown University
Featured panelists:
Stephanie Hirsh, Executive Director, Learning Forward
Segun Eubanks, Director, Teacher Quality, National Education Association
Rorie Harris, Coordinator of Teacher Effectiveness Measurement, Memphis City Schools
Additional panelists will be announced at a later date.
Moderators:
Cynthia G. Brown, Vice President for Education Policy, Center for American Progress
Glenda Partee, Associate Director for Teacher Quality, Center for American Progress