If you're interested in: --Spreading your excellent teaching to many more students --Leading a team of teaching peers toward the great outcomes you've gotten with your students by: collaborating with them co-teaching coaching co-planning giving (and getting)...
multi-classroom leadership
School Turnarounds: How Successful Principals Use Teacher Leadership
As the Opportunity Culture® initiative was beginning, three principals signed on to lead low-performing, high-poverty schools in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg and Metropolitan Nashville districts. The odds were stacked against them and their students—one school, for...
Opportunity Culture® Voices: Raising My Teacher Voice
“What does ‘teacher voice’ actually mean? Until this year, it sounded like a nice phrase, but it didn’t hold much meaning for me.
“But I have a job I love, one that shakes up traditional teaching and holds the promise of making a huge difference in students’ and teachers lives—as it did for my students. I wanted to spread the word about my job—and now, with positions like mine under threat at my school, I needed to find my voice. I needed to empower others to explore the idea of an Opportunity Culture.”
–Nashville, Tenn., Math Multi-Classroom Leader Karen Wolfson, in Raising My Teacher Voice to Save My Job–and My Students’ Success
Last year, as the multi-classroom leader for fifth- and sixth-grade math at Bailey STEM Magnet Middle School, a high-poverty, historically low-performing school, Karen Wolfson took her teaching team and their students to new heights:
“Our school had the highest level of growth in the entire district in math in grades three through eight. My team’s two teachers overcame the long odds that the previous year’s data predicted they would face. In one grade, we were projected to have just 12 students rank as proficient or advanced. We ended the year with 43. We saw similar results in the other grade. Both teachers ended the year with the highest level of teacher effectiveness and evaluation scores.
“These teachers were new to the district, its protocols, and the Tennessee state standards, and one was a first-year teacher. Their results were practically unheard of—but under the MCL model, they felt supported and successful.”
But a coming merger of her school with a high school threatens to do away with the MCL model that Karen feels passionate about.
“I can’t let MCL positions disappear. I want to see my district provide many, many more opportunities like mine. And that’s why I took the idea of “teacher voice” very seriously—and what I found was just how powerful my voice can be.”
Read what Karen did to raise her voice, and why she intends to keep speaking up, in the latest Opportunity Culture column in Real Clear Education, and hear her thoughts on an Opportunity Culture.
Creating Sustainable, Attractive Teacher Career Paths: NNSTOY Case Studies
What makes a sustainable teacher career path that attracts and retains great teachers? In a new report, the National Network of State Teachers of the Year (NNSTOY) looks at eight school district and charter career advancement initiatives for lessons and challenges,...
Where Is Teaching Really Different? New Opportunity Culture® Video
What could you do in an Opportunity Culture®? In a new video, teachers in Opportunity Culture® schools tell how their roles let them: --Reach more students with great teaching --Lead other teachers without leaving teaching—“the best of both worlds” --Give and get...
Opportunity Culture® Voices: MCL vs PLC–What’s the Difference?
“When out with friends or at dinner parties, I frequently get asked, ‘So what do you do?’ My ‘I’m a biology multi-classroom leader’ response receives perplexed looks, so my boyfriend usually pipes in, ‘It’s kind of like the science department chair’—and then I have to kindly say, ‘Well, sort of, except that I do all this other stuff…’
“As the leader of a five-person teaching team at a high-need Charlotte, N.C., high school, I teach a senior International Baccalaureate biology class every other day for one period—leaving 88 percent of my time to coach my team teachers, teach with them, pull out students to work one-on-one, lead data meetings, or anything else necessary to help my teachers and students succeed. Now, instead of teaching just my own 80 or 100 students, I reach all 500 biology students.”
–Charlotte-Mecklenburg Multi-Classroom Leader for Biology Erin A. Burns, in More Powerful Than a Department Chair
In January’s installment in the Opportunity Culture series on Real Clear Education, Erin Burns writes about her experience as a multi-classroom leader (MCL) at West Charlotte High School, and the difference between that role and a previous position as a “professional learning community” (PLC) lead. “As PLC lead, I was in the dark,” about what the teachers in the PLC actually did in the classrooms–and no true authority to match the title, regardless of how the teachers were doing.
As an MCL, she has authority to coach the team, and accountability for the results of all the team’s students. She continues to teach, but has just one regularly scheduled class–giving her great flexibility to co-teach, analyze student data for the team, lead the lesson planning for each week, and meet weekly with the team together and individually.
Read more in her full column about how she does it all, and what glitches she’s encountered–and the difference it makes for students, and hear her thoughts in the accompanying video.
This is the ninth in the Opportunity Culture series–read them all here.
Opportunity Culture® Results: Dashboard 2.0
22,000+ students reached by Opportunity Culture® teachers, more than 800 teachers in advanced or team roles, $2 million in higher pay in one year alone, and more high growth and less low growth than other schools: These are just a few results from the schools in...
Opportunity Culture® Voices: Why All Schools Need Multi-Classroom Leadership
"When I was asked to be on my school’s design team for a new initiative, I had no idea what I was getting into. I heard it would help build relationships with students and the community, and improve learning, so I thought, 'Cool. I’m in. That is right up my alley.'...
Five Ways That My MCL Has Made Me a Better Teacher
This post by Whitaker Brown, an eighth-grade science teacher at Ranson IB Middle School in Charlotte, N.C., first appeared on the Project L.I.F.T. website. See here to learn how to apply in February for Opportunity Culture® positions in the Project L.I.F.T. zone of...
The Importance of Having an MCL
This post by Nicole Hardy, a kindergarten teacher at Ashley Park Pre-K--8 Elementary School in Charlotte, N.C., first appeared on the Project L.I.F.T. website. See here to learn how to apply in February for Opportunity Culture® positions in the Project L.I.F.T. zone...