Pioneering Multi-Classroom Leaders Erin Burns, Ashley Jackson, Russ Stanton, and Karen Wolfson each took accountability for up to 500 students and led teaching teams toward higher growth and personalized learning for all those students. In these vignettes and accompanying video, they discuss their views of their roles, actions they took to lead their teams, mistakes they made, and how they recovered.
Beverley Tyndall
Pioneering Multi-Classroom Leaders
Pioneering Multi-Classroom Leaders Erin Burns, Ashley Jackson, Russ Stanton, and Karen Wolfson each took accountability for up to 500 students and led teaching teams toward higher growth and personalized learning for all those students in their high-need schools in...
Speaking Up: A Year’s Worth of Opportunity Culture® Voices
“How many teachers are out there struggling daily because of lack of support? How many burn out because they’ve tried all they know? How many leave our profession early because they can’t do it on their own any longer? How many kids suffer because they...
Yes, some Charlotte teachers make good money, but they’re rare
For more on this story, see our blog post, which details how many other well-paid Opportunity Culture® positions exist in Charlotte-Mecklenburg beyond the 26 cited here. Another 30 multi-classroom leaders make supplements of $13,000, and many other positions also...
Higher Pay for Charlotte Teachers: What Opportunity Culture® Provides
A great article in Saturday's Charlotte Observer highlighted what some Opportunity Culture® multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) make. As noted, 26 MCLs in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools receive supplements of $16,000 to $23,000--within school budgets, not from...
“What Is My Job, Anyway?” Teacher Hindsight From a Multi-Classroom Leader®
By Kristin Cubbage, first published by Real Clear Education, May 16, 2016
“My job is to ensure that every single one of my students, in all eight classes, has the most effective teacher standing up front each day, because our students deserve that kind of dedication to their lives.” After three years as a multi-classroom leader, Kristin Cubbage has a deeper understanding of her role and its impact. Read More…
Opportunity Culture® Voices: What Is My Job, Anyway? An MCL’s Thoughts
"When I became a multi-classroom leader in 2013, the position was new to our school, district and state—new to the nation, in fact. I have vivid memories of the questions I received, especially in an early meeting with team teachers, when one said, 'So what exactly do...
Kristin Cubbage on Being a Multi-Classroom Leader®
Kristin Cubbage, a multi-classroom leader at Ashley Park PreK-8 in Charlotte, N.C., describes the deep support her role enables her to provide to both teachers and students. Read Kristin’s related blog posts, An Opportunity for Change and “What Is My Job,...
Georgia Schools Join Opportunity Culture® Movement
Georgia’s Fulton County Schools district has joined the national Opportunity Culture initiative to extend the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for more pay, within recurring budgets. In 2015–16, Benjamin E. Banneker High School and Woodland Middle School, on the south side of Atlanta, are the district’s first to design Opportunity Culture plans for 2016–17 implementation. Both schools are part of Fulton County’s achievement zone, created in 2015 to focus on the traditionally struggling high school and its feeder schools. The zone aims to rapidly improve academic outcomes for its students.
Fulton County Schools, which sandwiches the separate school district for the city of Atlanta, includes the cities of Alpharetta, Roswell, and Sandy Springs on Atlanta’s north side, and Chattahoochee Hills, College Park, and Union City to the south. The district serves more than 95,000 students.
In Opportunity Culture models, a team of teachers and administrators at each school chooses among models that use job redesign and age-appropriate technology to reach more students with personalized, high-standards instruction—one hallmark of great teachers. School teams redesign schedules to provide additional school-day time for teacher planning and collaboration, typically with teacher-leaders leading teams and providing frequent, on-the-job development.
The school design teams reallocate school budgets to fund pay supplements permanently, in contrast to temporarily grant-funded programs. Schools in eight districts in six states nationwide are designing or implementing Opportunity Culture models. Pay supplements are as high as 50 percent, and an average of about 20 percent, of average teacher salaries.
“To dramatically change outcomes for students, we need to put our most effective teachers in front of the students who need them the most, and build opportunities for our most effective teachers to be leaders among their peers,” said Dara Jones-Wilson, executive director of the South Learning Community, in which the schools are located. “Teachers want leaders and coaches who are in the trenches with them and understand this work firsthand.”
The district serves more than 95,000 students in 57 elementary schools, 19 middle schools, 17 high schools, and eight charter organizations. In 2015–16, 45 percent of its students were eligible for free or reduced-price lunch; in 2014–15, 43 percent identified as black/African-American, 29 percent white, 15 percent Hispanic, and 10 percent Asian.
“Schools often struggle with leveraging talent in a way that leads to maximum impact for students. We believe that the mechanism for making this happen for our most proven and effective teachers is Opportunity Culture,” Banneker Principal Duke Bradley III said.
“Too often we fail to grow our teacher-leaders, and our students and staff never fully benefit from their full potential. The Opportunity Culture initiative not only allows us to retain these quality educators but extend their reach to realize an even greater student impact,” Woodland Principal Jason Stamper said. “This initiative also excites me because of the support and modeling that these teacher-leaders will be able to provide for our staff, thus making us all more effective. The end result: Our students win!”
Public Impact, which designed the Opportunity Culture model prototypes, is assisting Fulton County in planning its school designs and implementation, supported by a grant from the Dobbs Foundation, based in Atlanta. The grant supports only the transition work; higher teacher pay will be sustainably funded within existing school budgets.
To hear from Opportunity Culture educators about their experiences so far, see columns they’ve written for Real Clear Education, with accompanying videos, here.
Every School Can Have a Great Principal: A Fresh Vision for How
Published on Education Next, April 21, 2016 By Emily Ayscue Hassel and Bryan Hassel Great teachers matter—we all know that. But great principals matter nearly as much. We recently profiled three principals who achieved strong student learning growth in their schools...