Recruitment and retention challenges are once again leading to teacher shortages across the nation. Especially in urban and rural school districts, low salaries and poor working conditions often contribute to the difficulties of recruiting and keeping teachers, as can the challenges of the work itself. As a consequence, in many schools--especially…

High-quality teacher preparation is a critical building block of an effective and stable teacher workforce. In California, the Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC) currently oversees teacher preparation programs (TPPs) at more than 100 institutions, and these programs graduate more than 10,000 teacher candidates per year. Over the past…

Recruitment and retention challenges are once again leading to teacher shortages across the nation. Especially in urban and rural school districts, low salaries and poor working conditions often contribute to the difficulties of recruiting and keeping teachers, as can the challenges of the work itself. As a consequence, in many schools--especially…

The Instructional Leadership Corps (ILC) is a California collaborative teacher professional learning project in which expert teachers organize local professional development to spark iterative changes in practice. Launched in 2014, ILC is a joint effort of the California Teachers Association (CTA), the National Board Resource Center (NBRC), and…

The Instructional Leadership Corps (ILC) is an innovative professional learning project in which teacher leaders in California collaborate to lead sustainable professional development to support implementation of new student standards within their districts. Over more than 4 years, the ILC has served over 100,000 teachers. The responses of these…

The new Every Student Succeeds Act offers states flexibility to create new approaches to school accountability and to design appropriate interventions for schools in need of assistance. The law states that the interventions should be "evidence-based" and defines the kinds of research evidence states need to provide when choosing…

This article highlights several key findings from the research project sponsored by the National Staff Development Council. Data and findings drawn from this study will be used to establish benchmarks for assessing progress in professional development over time. Taken as a whole, this work will provide the most comprehensive picture and…

Contemporary school administrators play a daunting array of roles. They must be educational visionaries and change agents, instructional leaders, curriculum and assessment experts, budget analysts, facility managers, special program administrators, and community builders. New expectations for schools--that they successfully teach a broad range of…

This report synthesizes what research says works in improving teacher skills and knowledge, what nations that outperform the United States in education are doing, and provides an analysis of newly available data from the federal Schools and Staffing Survey and other sources to indicate where the nation stands in building the capacity of educators…

The School Leadership Study was designed to contribute important data on how high quality pre- and in-service programs are structured, how they implement the effective strategies noted in the research literature, and the impact of program graduates in the schools they lead. The study examines whether program components triangulate with graduate…

Productive strategies for evaluating outcomes are becoming increasingly important for the improvement, and even the survival, of teacher education. This article describes a set of research and assessment strategies used to evaluate program outcomes in the Stanford Teacher Education Program during a period of program redesign over the past 5 years.…

This book presents case studies of three highly successful teacher education programs. It is part of a three-volume series that includes seven case studies. It documents the goals, strategies, content, and processes of teacher education programs that are exemplars for preparing prospective teachers to engage in skillful, learner-centered practice.…

This study examines how mathematics and science teachers' classroom assessment practices were affected by the National Board Certification process. Using a 3-year, longitudinal, comparison group design, evidence of changes in teachers' classroom practice were measured on six dimensions of formative assessment. The National Board candidates began…

Assesses the design and potential outcomes of alternate route teacher certification programs, noting their perspectives and assumptions about teaching knowledge, teacher preparation, and the relationship to student learning. Alternate routes will be considered successful to the extent that they improve teacher preparation while working in concert…

Surveyed beginning teachers regarding their views on their preparation for teaching, beliefs and practice, and plans to remain in teaching. Teachers prepared in teacher education programs felt significantly better prepared than those prepared through alternative programs or without preparation. Teachers' views of their preparation varied. The…