Event Summary
As Congress considers reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act, policymakers, advocates, and parents are concerned about how to meet the requirement that states provide every student with high-quality teachers. To address these concerns, Brookings and Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School released the latest volume of The Future of Children journal, "Excellence in the Classroom."
Event Information
When
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
9:00 AM to 11:00 AM
Where
Falk Auditorium
The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20036
Map
On March 28 a slate of panelists including members of Congress, journal contributors, and other researchers and administrators, discussed options for improving teacher quality including in-service training, mentoring, and the recruitment of new, high-quality teachers.
Transcript
BRIAN JACOB: I think, as the volume states, there really is no one silver bullet and the effort to improve teacher effectiveness is not simply going to be a one-time initiative. It must be an ongoing initiative, both at the state and district level but also at the individual school level, and continuing research is important as we implement any of these recommendations.
I think there is unusual -- I am hard pressed to think of any policy that is so clear cut and there is such overwhelming evidence. I would advocate the entire country switching to it tomorrow with no pretense of evaluation or further work. Professional development, as we develop strategies for professional development, should be evaluated in a rigorous manner. Certainly, different methods of evaluating teachers and handling tenure decisions are fraught with a lot of complexities and should be piloted and should be rigorously evaluated, but this work needs to be done.
Read the journal and related material
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Participants
Overview
Brian Jacob
Assistant Professor of Public Policy, Harvard University; Visiting Professor of Public Policy, University of Michigan
Panelists
Congressman Michael Castle
R-Delaware
Congressman George Miller
D-California
Deborah Jewell-Sherman
Superintendent of Schools, Richmond, VA Public Schools
Kate Walsh
President, National Council on Teacher Quality
Randi Weingarten
President, United Federation of Teachers
Thomas Kane
Professor, Graduate School of Education, Harvard University