Exploring Predictors of Highly Effective Teachers Through Multilevel Model

This paper explored significant teacher and school level predictors of the status of highly effective teachers based on Florida teacher evaluation system employing a two-level multilevel analysis approach known as hierarchical generalized linear model (HGLM). The analysis used 3,895 teachers who taught students in Kindergarten to Grade 12 and 210 schools from one of the largest urban school districts in United States of America. In this study, teacher and school level data are used at level-1 and level-2 models, respectively. At teacher level, the results showed significant effects of percentage of student level demographic, academic, and disciplinary variables aggregated at teacher level as well as teacher’s experience and educational degree level. At school level, percentages of Black and percentage of Hispanic students showed significant effects on the status of highly effective teachers. The percentage of variance explained at school level is found 19.5% with an effect size of 0.44 which is determined as a “medium” size of school effect.

A Call for Dreamkeepers in Rural United States

Highly effective teachers not only are the percolators of student dreams but also actively convey their hopes and dreams, catalyzing student dreams of further education. Within rural education contexts, there are not enough Dreamkeepers—teachers, counselors, and other school personnel who inspire student success. This article explores the college aspiration gap among ninth graders by population density. The authors posit that the college enrollment gap between urban/suburban and town/rural students is correlated with this aspiration gap, which in turn is fueled by a lack of Dreamkeepers. They explored this using the High School Longitudinal Survey of 2009, comparing student postsecondary aspirations by locale and connecting those to student perceptions of their teachers’ expectations for their success. Differences emerged between urban and rural students concerning the intensity with which ninth graders perceived teachers’ expectations for their future successes. This article begins with a contextual discussion of social perceptions of urbanicity compared to rurality and then turns to a discussion of rural students’ college aspirations and the role of families and schools therein. Implications for further research and practice are discussed.

EDUCATION AND TEACHER MENTORING, THE BEST CAREER DEVELOPMENT ON STANDARD REFORMS IN ALBANIA

In exploring how to achieve this goal, educators are turning their attention and resources increasingly to the priority of professional development. Teacher mentoring programs are now perceived as an effective staff development approach for beginning teachers. By establishing teacher mentoring programs, the district serves two important purposes: novice teachers are given a strong start at the beginning of their careers, and experienced classroom teachers serving as mentors receive recognition and incentives (Little and Nelson, 1990). Researchers believe that mentoring can be a valuable process in educational reform for beginning teachers as well as veteran teachers (Ganser, 1996). Supporting beginning teachers at the outset contributes to retention of new teachers in the school system. Formalizing the mentor role for experienced teachers creates another niche in the career ladder for teachers and contributes to the professionalism of education. Effective organizations place a premium on talent when selecting, developing, and advancing their workforce. States and school districts tend to approach teachers from a one-size-fits-all perspective that inhibits efficient and productive workforce management. Organizing the teacher workforce for efficiency and productivity can best be done with careful management of individual talent and careers. Child development is a field of study concerned with the growth and well-being of children and young adults. The present practice of professional and career development too frequently fails to differentiate developmental paths for individual teachers. Not only is there a tendency to neglect identifying highly effective teachers for the purpose of retaining, advancing, and placing them in assignments that maximize the impact that they have on student learning, there is also a similar tendency to neglect identification of under-performers.

Video Considerations for the World Language edTPA

For decades in the United States, teacher preparation has been both a political and social focus. The development of highly effective teachers is highly scrutinized, and there is a new, nationally reviewed teacher performance assessment, edTPA, which teacher candidates must pass in order to become certified in 36 states and the District of Columbia. Research shows that teacher candidates in world language education have the most difficulty in assessing teaching and learning. In this chapter, the authors outline edTPA and present considerations regarding the use of video in conjunction with the integrated performance assessment as a means to improve novice teacher performance on this high-stakes assessment.

Seeing is Believing: A Case Study of Interdisciplinary, Experiential Science Education

Situated in a rural, impoverished town in Northeast Louisiana, this case study takes a deep look into two highly effective teachers’ pedagogical practices along with the concomitant patterns in attitudes towards scientific literacy among their students, as well as the role of the emergent curriculum in the process. It explored nuances of a unique approach to bring in interdisciplinary science through the backdoor, since science received little importance in the context of the school as well as community. Using qualitative measures, the study examined the teachers’ pedagogical practices and students’ attitudes towards science as well as subtle, everyday interactions involving the discourse of science and the resulting, emergent curriculum surrounding an innovative, teacher-designed intervention. Qualitative findings showed that the emergent curricular models in different teachers’ classrooms shaped the outcomes. Classroom interactions surrounding the intervention vis a vis the emergent curricula encompassed an open, dialogic and interactive discourse closer to a post-modern approach, where both teachers and students seemed to excel and together shaped a rich, recursive, relational, and rigorous process of learning and integration of the intervention, within a small creative window situated in a transitional context of K-12 education.

The effects of strategic compensation on teacher retention

This study examined the effects of strategic teacher compensation on the retention of teachers in a voluntary participation plan, especially the participation of hard-to-staff special education, high school mathematics, high school science, and high school language teachers. The first research question conducted a one-way chi-square analysis to determine if the observed retention rates of highly effective teachers were significantly different compared to the retention rates of highly effective teachers who elected to remain compensated by the traditional salary schedule. The study found no significant difference in the retention of highly effective teachers who were compensated by the district’s new strategic compensation plan compared to the retention of highly effective teachers who elected to remain compensated by the traditional salary schedule. The second research question conducted a one-way chi-square analysis to examine strategic compensation plan favorability among hard-to-staff special education, high school mathematics, high school science, and high school language teachers; it examined the voluntary strategic plan participation of hard-to-staff teachers compared to the voluntary strategic plan participation of non-hard-to-staff teachers. The study’s results revealed inconclusive findings between voluntary strategic compensation plan participation rates and hard-to-staff and non-hard-to-staff teachers, therefore concluding that the district’s strategic compensation plan was no more favorable to hard-to-staff teachers than to non-hard-to-staff teachers.

Video Considerations for the World Language edTPA

For decades in the United States, teacher preparation has been both a political and social focus. The development of highly effective teachers is highly scrutinized and there is a new, nationally-reviewed teacher performance assessment, edTPA, which teacher candidates must pass in order to become certified in 36 states and the District of Columbia. Research shows that teacher candidates in World Language Education have the most difficulty in assessing teaching and learning. In this chapter, the authors outline edTPA and present considerations regarding the use of video in conjunction with the Integrated Performance Assessment as a means to improve novice teacher performance on this high-stakes assessment.