New Metlife Surve of American Teachers

Interesting findings from the NEW METLIFE SURVEY OF THE AMERICAN TEACHER! Teachers are reporting significant changes in their profession. These changes come at a time when the teaching profession faces multiple challenges, including the retirement of teachers in the baby boom generation, economic pressures, and a greater emphasis on teacher quality and student achievement. To address these challenges, career pathways in education are changing, the role of the teacher is evolving, and collaboration is being emphasized as never before!

Here are just a few findings:

• Teachers very satisfied with their careers are more likely to work in schools with higher levels of collaborative activities (39% vs. 26%) and to strongly agree that the teachers in a school share responsibility for the achievement of all students (86% vs. 72%).
• More than half of teachers (56%) and half of principals (49%) say that some teachers in their school have a hybrid teaching role. Nearly four in ten teachers (37%) say they are interested in such a hybrid role.
• Three-quarters of teachers (75%) say they would like to continue to work in education beyond traditional retirement from classroom teaching.

The surveys are available online at www.metlife.com/teachersurvey.

We Survey Suite

Our high schools have used the We Learn survey to gauge how students perceive the learning environment and instruction and and its companion survey, the We Teach survey for teachers. Each survey gives great information in and of itself, but what is really interesting is that you can compare the two sets of data as the questions mirror one another from the two different perspectives. It has opened up some avenues of meaningful conversation for us.

To learn more about the We Survey suite, go to the International Center for Leadership in Education's website at /http://www.leadered.com/Wesurveys.html. There is an elementary version of the survey as well as the secondary version. We have two years of data from the We surveys. The data has been extremely helpful in moving forward our high school redesign initiative. Please contact me if I can provide you with any additional information.

I noticed they are introducing another companion survey, the We Support survey for parents. Sounds interesting.

Student Leadership Evaluation Tool

Teams

Several IZ initiatives center around student leadership. Many of you are wondering how to measure the impact of your initiatives pertaining to student leadership. Does anyone know of a tool that measures student leadership? Has Muriel Summers shared any ideas/instruments?

I think it would be helpful to share ideas as we write our evaluation plan for Phase II

Thanks, D

Logic Model Resource

I found a good resource from the University of Wisconsin that provides lots of information on Logic Models. Here is the website:
http://www.uwex.edu/ces/pdande/evaluation/evallogicmodel.html

You Are Invited . . .

I'd like to invite all of you to visit Cabell County's IZ consortiums webpages that are linked to our district webpage. At this time the webpages are primarily being used as a vehicle to convey information to the large number of staff involved in each Innovation Zone. You can click on the middle icon (the state's IZ icon) and be directed to the state IZ site. Or, you can click on the icon to the right or left to enter the elementary or secondary consortium's site. Here is the address:
http://boe.cabe.k12.wv.us/schoolimprovement/InnovationZoneOverview.htm We would love to have your feedback! Gerry Sawrey

Grant resource for Innovation Zone teams!

Dominion Foundation Offers K-12 Educational Grants in Math and Science - The Dominion Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Dominion Resources, is accepting applications for Educational Partnership grants of up to $10,000 to help students in kindergarten through 12th grade strengthen their skills in mathematics and science. The program is open to schools and institutes working to benefit students in the nine states where Dominion does business - Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia and West Virginia. The foundation expects to award about $300,000 in total grants. Although the majority of the grants will range from $1,000 to $5,000, the foundation expects to award a few exceptional grants of up to $10,000. Grants in this category have a broader focus and involve larger numbers of children and/or classes or have a school-wide / system-wide focus or involve the surrounding community. The program also offers mini-grants of up to $1,000 for projects that enhance the teaching of math and/or science. Deadline May 1, 2010.

Professional Learning Communities

This is a link to an article titled "Creating a Professional Learning Community: Cottonwood Creek School" that is a case study on developing professional learning communities with several links to additional information on the subject.

If you find additional information on professional learning communities be sure to share it on the blog!