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• Legislative Action Center - Statement of John Wright, President of Arizona Educationa Association on Improving Teacher Quality
  

  Statement of John Wright, President, Arizona Education Association

  Submitted before the Senate Subcommittee on Labor, Health & Human Services, Education and Related Agencies

  April 16, 2008
  

  The Federal Role: Quality Teachers in Every Classroom

  Chairman Harkin and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to testify today on the important topic of teacher quality, including the federal role and specifically what the Congress can do through the education appropriations bill to help states, schools, and teachers ensure that every child has a quality teacher while also improving the working conditions necessary to foster and support quality teaching.

  I am John Wright, president of the 33,000-member Arizona Education Association (AEA), one of the state affiliates of the 3.2 million-member National Education Association (NEA). I am speaking here today on behalf of both AEA and NEA. In addition to serving as AEA president, I am also president of the National Council of State Education Associations, which is the organization within NEA that represents the state leaders of all 50 NEA state affiliates. I also serve on NEA's Professional Standards and Practices committee which develops and makes recommendations regarding NEA policy on teacher quality issues. And most importantly I have been a classroom teacher for over 20 years, starting in Connecticut in 1985, and then moving in 1990 to Arizona where I taught elementary and middle school in the Window Rock Unified School District on the Navajo Nation.

  Improving the quality of teaching in America's schools continues to be a central focus of school improvement and educational reform efforts. This is because teacher quality matters. Teachers do not enter the classroom as accomplished professionals — they increase their knowledge and skills with increased experience, and, as a result, effect greater student learning. Simply put, good teachers produce good students.1 In fact, research continues to show that having a good teacher is a key to students' success. The National Education Association understands and values this and is a leading voice that supports and promotes quality teaching. Throughout its long history, the NEA has advanced the profession of teaching and works toward a goal of a qualified teacher in every classroom.

  In my statement I first review NEA's policies on teacher quality, next highlight some of our initiatives to improve teacher quality, and finally focus on the federal role.

  What Constitutes Quality?

  In the last five years, several bodies of research, most notably What Matters Most: Teaching and America's Future, published by the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (NCTAF),2 have found that teacher quality is the single most important factor in student success. Several other researchers echo these findings.3 But just what constitutes quality? Does more and better preparation make a difference? NCTAF believes it does, advocating for preparation that focuses on subject matter expertise, knowledge and understanding of how children learn and develop, and the use of a wide range of teaching strategies. The NEA agrees.

  In 2007, NEA defined (in broad terms) what characterizes a quality teacher: one who knows his/her subject matter; one knows how to teach that subject matter; and one who understands how students learn and what it takes to reach them (See Appendix A ). NEA believes that defining a quality teacher can best be achieved using a set of principles and standards, combined with a process of preparation, licensure, support, and assessment. To illustrate these principles, standards and processes more clearly, NEA developed its "Principles of Professional Practice" that define the knowledge, skills, and dispositions a quality teacher should possess:

  A Quality Teacher…

  • Designs and facilitates instruction that incorporates the students' developmental levels, skills, and interests with content knowledge;
  • Develops collaborative relationships and partners with colleagues, families, and communities focused on meaningful and deep learning;
  • Provides leadership and advocacy for students, quality education, and the education profession;
  • Demonstrates in-depth content and professional knowledge;
  • Participates in ongoing professional learning as an individual and within the professional learning community;
  • Utilizes multiple and varied forms of assessment and student data to inform instruction, assess student learning, and drive school improvement efforts;
  • Establishes environments conducive to effective teaching and learning;
  • Integrates cultural competence and an understanding of the diversity of students and communities into teaching practice to enhance student learning;
  • Utilizes professional practices that recognize public education as vital to strengthening our society and building respect for the worth, dignity and equality of every individual;
  • Strives to overcome the internal and external barriers that impact student learning;
  • Demonstrates generic and content-specific knowledge in areas such as child development, classroom management, motivating children to learn, interpreting and using assessment data, individualizing instruction, aligning content to the state's standards, developing appropriate instructional materials, and working with children with disabilities or from other cultures.

  Attaining knowledge and skill in each of these practices is not easy and cannot be effectively measured by a single snapshot in time (such as one classroom observation or a single standardized test of teacher knowledge). Rather, teacher learning should be described as occurring along a continuum from preservice (university level) through inservice (school level) years. In this view of teacher learning, teacher preparation does not end once teachers are in the classroom but rather continues with the induction of beginning teachers and with professional development for experienced teachers.4 NEA believes that if states and/or the federal government are to make a serious commitment to ensuring a quality teacher for every child, they must support a systemic approach that recognizes, supports and measures a teacher's growth and ability along the various stages of a quality continuum—a continuum that includes recruitment, preparation, licensure, hiring, induction, continued practice and professional development through mastery, on-going performance assessment, and advanced certification.

  NEA's Teacher Quality Initiatives

  NEA continues to highly value its role as a leader in teacher quality and as a result, we are actively engaged in a wide-range of activities and initiatives that promote a quality teaching profession.

• Teacher Working Conditions Survey Initiatives
  It is not reasonable to expect individuals to perform effectively if working conditions do not permit them to do so. If qualified individuals are working in nonproductive environments, the problem likely is systemic and won't be resolved by nonsystemic responses. In the teaching profession, many effective teachers leave schools—and sometimes the profession-when working conditions do not support professional practice. NEA believes that the workplace enables or constrains good teaching and consequently, is a partner in a number of state initiatives examining teacher working conditions. Research from my own state of Arizona as well as a number of other states such as North Carolina, Mississippi, and Kansas5 shows that if effective teachers are to be retained in teaching and supported in doing their best work with students, they must have a workplace that promotes their efforts in a variety of ways such as: 1) increased time to focus on student learning, collaborate with peers, and learn from each other; 2) sufficient materials, resources and facilities to teach successfully; 3) opportunities to influence the design and organization of the school; 4) the support and assistance from collaborative school leaders; and, 5) support through effective, relevant, and continuous professional development. Simply put, teacher working conditions equal student learning conditions.
  
  
• C.A.R.E. — Strategies for Closing the Achievement Gaps
  NEA's Culture, Abilities, Resilience, and Effort (C.A.R.E.) guide focuses on closing the gaps in student achievement by examining and utilizing research on working with culturally and linguistically diverse students. The guide examines research on cultural, language, and economic differences, as well as at unrecognized and undeveloped abilities, resilience, and effort and motivation-the "C.A.R.E. themes," and translates that research into instructional and other strategies that engender high levels of student learning.
  
  
• Ensuring Quality Teacher Preparation
  Facilitating the involvement of over 200 teachers in reviewing and accrediting over 700 teacher preparation institutions through the National Council on the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE