Creating “America’s Teacher Corps”

Educators in America’s classrooms vary substantially in their ability, with dramatic consequences for student achievement. Teacher effectiveness – how to identify and incentivize teacher performance – is now at the centerpiece of federal and state efforts to improve education outcomes.

On March 15, the Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings released a report on teacher quality, the second in a series of Brown Center policy proposals on rethinking the federal role in education. The report proposes a new federal program, America’s Teacher Corps, to support the development of effective teacher evaluation systems at the district and state level in order to keep the best teachers in the classroom, enhance the likelihood that more qualified people will enter teaching, provide opportunities for potentially good teachers to realize their potential through additional support and development and encourage qualified teachers to teach in hard-to-staff schools. Highly effective teachers would receive national recognition and, conditional on service in high-poverty schools, a substantial salary bonus and a portable credential.

After the program, the presenters took audience questions.