Most of the work being done to address teacher shortages is happening at the school and district levels. This localized lens is key, says WestEd senior managing director Gretchen Weber in Addressing the Teacher Shortage: Recruiting and Retaining Teachers—Q&A, because the optimal solution at any particular school depends on factors at play at that site. The specific combination of factors, she notes, can also vary widely across schools.

Furthermore, a new review by the Regional Educational Laboratory Northwest examines the relationship between teacher working conditions and teacher retention, shedding light on where districts should be focused: the most common working conditions that may drive teachers to come, stay, or leave.

That said, state departments of education can play key roles in opening new opportunities that districts and schools may not otherwise discover. “In short, state departments of education have a tremendous opportunity right now to pull specific levers that will strengthen the entire profession,” says Caitlin Beatson, senior program associate at WestEd, who serves as a deputy director of the Region 2 Comprehensive Center.

Some policy solutions to increasing the teacher pipeline are fairly easy to identify. For example:

• Connecticut recently opened up its certification requirements and, with it, the opportunity for thousands more licensed educators beyond its borders to work in its schools. More educators licensed outside of Connecticut may now consider working in the state’s schools since it moved to give substantial reciprocity to educators from 11 nearby states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Educators in select states who hold an “active, valid certificate” may apply and obtain a Connecticut certificate after verification by the Connecticut State Department of Education now that the northeastern reciprocity agreement has been expanded. Research supports this policy change: Licensed teachers who move in search of job opportunities are more likely to select states with reciprocity because transition barriers and requirements for obtaining licensure in those states are reduced. To assist Connecticut in making this key move, the Region 2 Comprehensive Center developed the Teacher Certification Reciprocity Tool, which compares certification requirements among the identified states and territories and significantly reduces the time required for Connecticut State Department of Education analysts to approve out-of-state candidates for certification.

To learn more about this tool and access it, visit the Comprehensive Center Network’s Enhancing Certification Reciprocity to Expand Connecticut’s Educator Talent Pool. Furthermore, to access the Interstate Teacher Mobility Compact, a new national compact that will create teacher reciprocity among participating states once 10 states come aboard, visit the Teacher Compact website.

• New Mexico has increased pay for teachers in its highest-need schools. The state now requires minimum entry-level salaries of $50,000, up from $40,000 for a 9-month contract, to encourage prospective teachers to work in schools with high populations of at-risk students. “Improved teacher salaries have been an important incentive to get people back into the classroom, and New Mexico’s teachers appreciate the hard work of Governor [Michelle] Lujan Grisham and the Legislature to make this happen,” the state’s teachers’ union president, Mary Parr-Sanchez, said in a statement to ABC News.

For more on why the first step in solving teacher shortages should be increasing teacher compensation, see Now is the Time to Increase Teacher Compensation by Sabrina Laine, chief program officer at WestEd.

But when it comes to how states should assist school districts technically in problem-solving, planning, and course correction, given the sheer size of the demand, it is not always clear where to start. “Most state education agencies don’t have the thousands of employees that are ideally needed to build out the individual capacity of hundreds or thousands of districts,” says Beatson. “State time and energy has to be very intentionally organized and targeted.”

WestEd Comprehensive Centers have identified a way for states to do just that. States served by Comprehensive Centers in Regions 2, 13, and 15 are helping their respective school districts strengthen educator workforces by serving in capacity-building roles that fall into four categories:

• Communicators of mission-critical data. For example, states can conduct and disseminate key relative data analyses of the educator workforce, including vacancy and attrition rates and level of teacher diversity, through a data dashboard.
• Connectors to resources. States can efficiently connect localities to critical substantive resources like evidence-based best practices, guidebooks, toolkits, trainings, and webinars.
• Conveners of groups of districts with common needs. States may, for example, invite groups of districts grappling with common contextual needs to a summit where they can engage in peer learning, sharing, highlighting bright spots, and forming partnerships.
• Coordinators across fields or jurisdictions. Finally, when agencies or other regions serve similar populations or are tackling similar challenges, states may establish cross-state or cross-agency connections that districts cannot efficiently establish on their own. For example, states are best suited to pull labor, workforce development, and education agencies together to effectively coordinate services and supports regarding registered teacher apprenticeships, now a federal priority.

“State education agencies simply can’t do it all,” Beatson says. “They can, however, drive these four capacity-building gears to help LEAs along the path toward solving these issues.”

To expedite local progress and maximize effectiveness—to pull as many levers as possible to help solve the teacher shortage, as Beatson puts it—Regional Comprehensive Centers throughout the nation have been working in recent years to help the states they serve implement a range of solutions.

Coming next: In June, we will showcase snapshots, by lever, of current state-level teacher workforce efforts underway in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Nevada, New York, and Rhode Island.

The Regions 2, 13, and 15 Comprehensive Centers work with state education agencies and their regional and local constituents in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Utah, and the Bureau of Indian Education to improve outcomes for all children and better serve communities through capacity-building technical assistance, content expertise, and other services.

The contents of this blog post were developed under a grant from the Department of Education. However, the contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the federal government.

Dana Grayson Chambers is a Project Director with WestEd’s Strategic Resource Planning and Implementation team. As the Director of Strategic Resource Planning and Implementation, Jason Willis oversees and guides the agency’s school finance, governance, and accountability efforts. 

With school systems across the country sounding alarms about teacher shortages in critical areas, and surveys of educators pointing to record levels of burnout and stress, education policymakers continue to examine how best to approach much-needed increases in teacher compensation. But how can education leaders identify and allocate the funds necessary to improve teacher compensation? While Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) pandemic relief funds have pumped billions of dollars into education, the last round of these funds will expire in September 2024, making them an unsustainable source for increasing teacher compensation. Leaders must instead find ongoing revenue sources.

In this blog post, the fourth in the Money Matters: Conversations About Teacher Compensation Series, we’ll walk through two approaches that can help implement and sustain increased teacher compensation.

Revenue-Raising vs. Expense Trade-Off

Education leaders can take two approaches to support new investments: revenue-raising or expense trade-off. In a revenue-raising approach, an education leader implements a method of increasing revenue, but it must be ongoing. For example, this approach might entail adjusting the local property tax rate and investing that additional revenue in teacher compensation. (By contrast, grants may raise revenue but are not ongoing and pose the same challenge as ESSER funds—they are short-term funds that will not cover the cost of additional expenses in the long term.) Through an expense trade-off approach, leaders determine what can be moved from one line item to another in the budget to support a new initiative. Both approaches require appropriate buy-in from all relevant groups.

Examples of Revenue-Raising Approaches

In Florida, several districts, including Palm Beach and Orange counties, raised revenue by raising property taxes to increase teacher compensation. ​​​​At the federal level, bills in the House and Senate propose increasing the starting teacher pay to a minimum of $60,000. The Senate bill would fund the increases by raising the estate tax, while the House bill would fund the increases through teacher salary incentive grants to states—both revenue-raising approaches.

In Tennessee, Governor Bill Lee has proposed raising the minimum teacher salary to $50,000 over the next four years. While short-term implementation would be funded through one-time state funding ​​​​(revenue raising through the use of one-time funds), long-term implementation will be built into the rollout of the state’s new funding formula, the Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement Act (TISA), which would protect state investments that are specifically intended for teacher pay. ​​Building teacher compensation costs into their new weighted funding formula is another example of revenue raising, through which districts will receive increased funding from the state in future years to sustain the increase in compensation.

Examples of Expense Trade-Off Approaches

In Arizona, several districts have established differentiated staffing models to expand the reach and effectiveness of teacher leaders and build the capacity of novice teacher residents through the Next Education Workforce initiative. In a few districts implementing this model, teacher leaders are offered significant stipends of $7,000–$15,000, while teacher residents receive an annual stipend of $12,000–$20,000—all through a creative expense trade-off. For the two pilot districts, the funding was provided by lever​​aging unused dollars from teacher vacancies—one unfilled teacher role could fund three residents’ annual stipends plus the teacher leader stipend for supporting those residents.

Across the nation, districts have used the federal Teacher Incentive Fund program to design and implement teacher performance pay and incentive programs. To sustain these programs beyond the grant funding period, several districts sought expense trade-offs to reallocate existing district resources. For example, Guilford County in North Carolina increased its teacher-to-student ratio in one subject area by one student in order to realize an additional $2 million to cover incentives in 20 schools where support was most needed. Similarly, Harrison County in Colorado re-examined its salary schedule to reallocate stipends previously given for degree attainment and experience to pay for performance incentives.

Deciding Which Approach to Take to Increase Teacher ​​Compensation

Increasing teacher compensation requires a comprehensive process to make the case for why the change is needed, identify who needs to be engaged, and determine what, how, and when the approach will take ​​place. As states approach the question of how to identify the resources to fund a compensation increase, the following considerations can inform which approach is right for their local context.

1. Identify the specific type of compensation you want to provide or increase. Increasing teacher compensation can take many forms—raising salaries, adjusting health benefits packages, providing loan forgiveness, offering housing stipends, and more. Labor markets are local, so needs vary even within states. Identify a specific compensation goal (or goals) for increasing teacher compensation. For example, if you have a large portion of young teachers who are pursuing or have recently completed graduate-level degrees, you might decide to ​​​​invest in loan forgiveness to reduce their debt burden in exchange for a commitment to remaining in the district in a high-need position for a set length of time. If you are facing critical shortages in particular subjects (e.g., early childhood, English learners), you could explore sign-on or retention bonuses or increased compensation for teachers in those roles. You might also consider surveying your educator workforce to understand what types of compensation or benefits would be of most value to ​​​​them and most likely to influence recruitment and retention decisions. Ensuring that your compensation approach aligns with the identified priorities for your educator workforce is essential.
2. Establish a rationale for why the investment is necessary. With a clear understanding of the type of compensation you want to provide and the data to support it, you can create a compelling rationale for investment. This messaging will be key to obtaining buy-in from critical partners (e.g., district leaders, the school board, the state legislature, the community) and will vary based on your approach. In an expense trade-off scenario, the messaging must provide a rationale explaining how reallocating resources from one expense to another is a more valuable allocation of resources. In a revenue-raising scenario, the messaging should explain why, for example, increasing taxes would yield a return on investment and ultimately benefit taxpayers.
3. Calculate the cost of achieving your goal. Determine how much it will cost to implement your compensation increase. Work with your business office, legislature, or a research partner to create a detailed cost estimate for implementing the envisioned compensation increase. This estimate should involve both the one-time costs for implementing such a change and any sustained costs that will be required each year.
4. Examine the totality of what is available. Next, examine your budget. The process of reviewing investments and deciding what to sustain or scale and what to taper is one that districts should already be engaged in as they look ahead to the sunset of ESSER dollars. Are there investments that aren’t contributing to your school or district’s goals that could be phased out? If so, explore what expense(s) you might trade off to realize your teacher compensation goals. If no expense trade-off can be made, explore revenue-raising approaches.
5. Build buy-in and good will. Is there enough political will within your institution and community to adopt increased taxes to raise teacher salaries? Who would be most impacted by reallocating funds from one line item to another? Whether taking a revenue-raising or expense trade-off approach, buy-in from all groups affected will be essential to success. Leverage your “why” and rationale to build support for your approach.

The significant changes to the teaching profession caused by the pandemic have made recruiting and retaining educators more challenging. In addition to improving public perceptions of the teaching profession, increasing teacher compensation is crucial to reducing teacher shortages. Although ESSER funds can be used to compensate teachers in the short term—by providing one-time retention bonuses, or stipends for student loans or housing costs, for example—engaging continuously in conversations about expense trade-offs and ways to raise revenue are essential to making increased compensation ​​​​sustainable.

Other Posts in the Money Matters: Conversations About Teacher Compensation Series:

• Now is the Time to Increase Teacher Compensation. Insights From Sabrina Laine, Chief Program Officer at WestEd
• Busting the Myths About Teacher Compensation and the Teaching Profession
• The Case for Differentiated Staffing in the Classroom

Visit WestEd’s Teacher Compensation Initiative.

This post first appeared on the REL West blog and is posted here with permission.

To ensure students are prepared for the future, they need an effective teacher in every classroom.¹ In reality, schools across the country are experiencing teacher vacancies that can impact educational opportunities for students. Research shows that educator shortages disproportionately impact students of color, students from low-income backgrounds, students with disabilities, and students from rural communities.²

While teacher recruitment and retention issues are prevalent nationwide, REL West has been working within our West Region to understand the issues at a local level and identify ways we can work with our partners to bring evidence-based resources and couple them with the local contexts of each state to identify ways to apply data use and applied research to inform strategies at the state and district level. In fact, through needs sensing with partners at the Utah State Board of Education (USBE), teacher retention and early career attrition were identified as issues where the state seeks to make evidence-informed changes.

In response, REL West and USBE have launched the Utah Early Career Teacher Retention Partnership to learn more about the root causes of early career attrition across the state, along with identifying evidence-based strategies that districts can use to address them.

To address issues around teacher recruitment and retention, there are evidence-based efforts underway to identify solutions that can improve the teacher pipeline and help retain seasoned teachers once they enter the classroom. REL West reviewed efforts by other Regional Educational Laboratories for lessons learned, data, and research to inform our current work in Utah.

For example:

• REL Southwest has supported state education agencies to design and implement “Grow Your Own” teacher programs, which help school districts identify potential teacher candidates and provide them with support to become certified teachers.³
• REL Mid-Atlantic has worked with the state of Pennsylvania to investigate how teacher and principal residency programs can help address issues of staffing and teacher shortages.⁴ Research has shown that residency programs offer longer, more intensive training than traditional educator preparation programs and rather than exclusively focusing on candidates majoring in education, residency programs can seek to recruit candidates who are recent college graduates in other fields or who are professionals looking for a career change.⁵
• REL Northeast & Islands partnered with the New York State Education Department (NYSED) to evaluate the certification and placement of new teachers in order to examine their certification pathways, their certification areas, and their subsequent placement and retention across the state. Understanding this data has helped to identify content areas in which teacher shortages were more prevalent.⁶

Each of these examples includes promising practices and evidence-based strategies to strengthen the teacher workforce and ensure an effective teacher in every classroom.

1. Opper, I. M. (2019). Teachers matter: Understanding teachers’ impact on student achievement. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. Retrieved from https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR4312.html
2. U.S. Department of Education. (n.d.). Fact sheet. Accessed November 11, 2022, from https://www.ed.gov/coronavirus/factsheets/teacher-shortage
3. Barkowski, E. (2021). Supporting state education agencies to design and implement Grow Your Own teacher programs. Retrieved from https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/Products/Blog/100453
4. 10 factors to consider when implementing teacher and principal residency programs. (2021). Retrieved from https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/regions/midatlantic/app/Docs/Infographics/RELMA_PDE_Teacher_Residency_Infographic_508c.pdf
5. Ibid.
6. Lemieux et al. (2021). Additional certification for teachers in New York State: Teachers’ experience and employment location, certification pathways, and certification areas. Retrieved from https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/Products/Publication/100530

This post first appeared on the REL West blog and is posted here with permission.

A continuing question at the national and state levels is whether there are enough teachers in classrooms to create a consistent and effective learning environment. When classrooms lack qualified teachers, student achievement and student success are affected. Teacher shortages can significantly depress student achievement, as schools often cancel courses due to vacancies or staff classes with substitutes and underprepared teachers who are not certified to teach their subject matter.

Underprepared teachers leave their schools at 2 to 3 times the rate of those who enter with comprehensive preparation. High turnover rates, in turn, can contribute to staff instability that disrupts relationships with students and other teachers, undermines professional learning, and impedes collaboration, all of which are critical to creating the supportive environments students need after nearly two years of disrupted learning.¹ This blog post shares high-level data around the teacher pipeline and teacher attrition both nationally and in the West Region.

Compared to other aspects of the educational experience, teachers have a significant impact on student achievement.² Research has demonstrated that teachers have two to three times the effect of any other school factor, including school and district administration, on student performance on reading and math tests.³

Teacher vacancies are notably higher in schools with more students from low-income families and more students of color. In January 2022, data from the Institute of Education Sciences School Pulse Survey indicated that schools with higher percentages of minority students were more likely to report higher proportions of vacant positions than those with lower percentages of minority students. In addition, data indicates that schools in higher-poverty areas had at least 5 percent of their teacher positions vacant at a higher rate than schools in lower-poverty areas.⁴

These issues are not new and point to systemic challenges in creating equitable school environments for low-income students and students of color.

With this framing of the issue and impact of teacher shortages on students, the following provides an overview of the national landscape of teacher shortages and specifically looks at the region served by REL West.

The National Landscape of Teacher Shortages

Teacher Pipeline

The pipeline of future teachers has been decreasing for decades. Between the 2008/09 and 2018/19 academic years, the number of people completing a teacher education program dropped by nearly a third.⁵ Data also revealed that, over the past 50 years, the number of education degrees awarded plunged from 200,000 annually in the 1970s to fewer than 90,000 in 2019.⁶ And then COVID-19 hit.

Attrition and Teacher Vacancies

Prior to the pandemic, about 8 percent of teachers left the teaching profession each year and the majority of attrition typically occurred with teachers in the first five years of beginning their teaching careers. According to the RAND Corporation’s American Teacher Panel from 2021, as many as 25 percent of teachers were considering leaving their teaching position.⁷ Having to change instruction modes, health concerns, and high levels of job burnout were all reported as reasons teachers left the profession during the pandemic.⁸

Teacher Shortage in the REL West Region

Digging into the data shows that teacher shortages vary by school location. Even within the same district, some schools—particularly those in wealthier neighborhoods—experience less teacher turnover and were more likely to start the school year with a full staff in 2020.⁹

When looking at data specific to the REL West region, there are some similarities between states. Each state, however, has unique issues that highlight the nuances in teacher shortages and classroom vacancies.

For example, as of early August 2022, the Nevada State Education Association estimated that roughly 3,000 teaching jobs remained unfulfilled across the state’s school districts.¹⁰ During the same period in Arizona, there were more than 2,500 teacher vacancies statewide and another 4,000 teacher positions were being filled by individuals that did not meet standard teacher requirements.¹¹

While there are a number of unfulfilled teaching positions in Utah, the main concern is with individuals who support teachers, such as paraeducators. For example, in Granite School District that serves 60,000 students in the Salt Lake Valley, there are 177 open positions—81 for paraeducators and 50 for nutritional services.¹²

In California, school district location and the economics and demographics of the area are associated with whether schools experience classroom shortages. Many districts that serve large numbers of high-needs students reported severe teacher shortages as the school year began, leaving students with substitutes or administrators to fill in until the district could hire more teaching staff.¹³

As REL West continues to develop partnerships in our region, we will explore issues of teacher recruitment and retention as we strive to help our partners improve student outcomes and ensure success for all students. Stay tuned!

1. Carver-Thomas, D. (2022). Teacher shortages take center stage. Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/blog/teacher-shortages-take-center-stage.
2. Opper, I. M. (2019). Teachers matter: Understanding teachers’ impact on student achievement. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR4312.html
3. Ibid.
4. 2022 School Pulse Panel, Institute of Education Sciences. https://ies.ed.gov/schoolsurvey/spp/
5. The American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. (2022). https://aacte.org/2022/03/aactes-national-portrait-sounds-the-alarm-on-declining-interest-in-education-careers/
6. Heubeck, E. (2022, May 3). The pool of future teachers is dwindling. Can it be refilled? Ed Week.  https://www.edweek.org/leadership/the-pool-of-future-teachers-is-dwindling-can-it-be-refilled/2022/05
7. Steiner, E. D., & Woo, A. (2021). Job-related stress threatens the teacher supply: Key findings from the 2021 state of the U.S. teacher survey. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA1108-1.html
8. Zamarro, G., Camp, A., Fuchsman, D., & McGeem, J. (2022). Understanding how COVID-19 has changed teachers’ chances of remaining in the classroom. Sinquefield Center for Applied Economic Research. https://www.slu.edu/research/sinquefield-center-for-applied-economic-research/working-paper-22-01-covid-changed-teachers.pdf
9. Carver-Thomas, D., Leung, M., & Burns, D. (2021). California teachers and COVID-19: How the pandemic is impacting the teacher workforce. Learning Policy Institute. https://doi.org/10.54300/987.779
10. Nevada State Education Association. https://www.nsea-nv.org/node/2121#5096
11. Arizona School Personnel Administrators Association. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1drApN4WUzWzDzfu-t_bnckYHdmRKNojY/edit
12. Miller, J. (2022, August 22). Utah schools face staff shortages that can make it ‘incredibly challenging to operate.’  Salt Lake Tribune. https://www.sltrib.com/news/2022/08/22/utah-schools-face-staff/
13. Carver-Thomas, D., Leung, M., & Burns, D. (2021). California teachers and COVID-19: How the pandemic is impacting the teacher workforce. Learning Policy Institute. https://doi.org/10.54300/987.779

Differentiated staffing involves students in a classroom having multiple educators working with them in a range of capacities based on those educators’ strengths and skills. It has shown promise for reducing the burden on individual teachers, retaining teachers, and supporting new teachers, as well as advancing student learning. In this blog post, the third in the Money Matters: Conversations About Teacher Compensation Series, Kate Wright and Gretchen Weber discuss the model, its benefits, and possible barriers to implementation.

Wright serves as Co-Director of the Region 15 Comprehensive Center at WestEd. As a Senior Managing Director at WestEd, Weber leads a portfolio of work in School Choice, Literacy, and Talent Development and Diversity.

What is a differentiated staffing model?

Gretchen Weber: We have this outdated model of our teacher workforce that requires teachers to “be all things to all people all the time.” Over the last couple of decades, we’ve seen other professions and workplaces change quite a bit. Work has become more flexible and collaborative with a lot more tech infusion and more diversity in the workplace. I don’t know if we’re seeing all those same attributes happen in teaching. So that would be an indicator that we need to rethink the education workplace and the way the workforce operates within it.

In other professions, we see a lot of specialization. Workers become deep experts in a particular area to serve the people they’re serving. Healthcare is a great example of that, but if you look at the teacher’s role and break down all the things we expect—you’ve got to be the content expert, you’ve got to know everything there is to know about teaching high school math or computer science or early childhood, and you’ve got to be a cognitive child development expert and adolescent psychologist. You’ve got to be a data specialist in assessment and engagement data, a family outreach and engagement coordinator, a materials specialist, a curriculum developer, a coach, an instructional coordinator, and do technology integration.

You have to stay up on the latest research in the field and apply that to your practice, and mentor new teachers, and be an equity specialist, and be a leader within your school leading the PLC or the community of practice, and a student and child advocate, and a services coordinator to make sure students are getting all they need in and out of the classroom. You could require someone to be specialized and just one of those things could be a full-time job.

Kate Wright: I totally agree and it’s not hyperbole—all those are pieces of a teacher’s job. The one-classroom, one-teacher model is the same model we’ve had in place for the entirety of public education. The class sizes might look different—we’ve evolved from the one-room schoolhouse to multiple classrooms—but that dynamic looks the same. If you think about other professions, there have been innovations as the culture and our communities have evolved and I think it’s time for us to be thinking the same way in education.

I know very few people who don’t operate on a team in their work environment, who are not doing some piece of the puzzle of the work that needs to happen for that organization. Something as challenging, as fundamental, and as critical as education requires a model that provides access for all students to as many experts and resources as possible.

GW: With differentiated staffing, you’d be taking this approach to all the responsibilities that have gotten bundled up into one person at the head of the classroom and unbundling it into specialists that all serve the group of kids. An entire grade is served by somebody who’s a content expert in what needs to be taught at that grade level, somebody who’s a data specialist, somebody who does technology integration, etc. You’re using all of the skills and expertise of multiple adults in a way that serves all of the students well.

I keep imagining that I am the teacher of record in a group of four 4th grade classrooms with a total of 120 total kids, but I have three apprentice teachers who I’m working with. I have an assessment expert, a family outreach engagement coordinator, and a data specialist. My job is to design and plan instruction and to deliver a lot of that instruction. The apprentice teachers support that. They work with small groups of kids—they might teach the mini-lessons, they might work one-on-one with students in more of a tutoring capacity. They might also teach 30 kids at a time and then we rotate kids through different lessons. And the apprentice teachers come to me to get the instruction.

This model really can work when you start to think more creatively about the expertise that people have. My data specialist meets with me during my planning time and says, “All right, you know last month[’s] assessment data shows ‘X.’ I think that means we need to regroup in math this week, so these kids go here and do this.” And my family outreach engagement coordinator has called a family because one student has been absent a lot lately. It’s just trying to unbundle all the things that one teacher would be doing for 30 kids, spreading it across 120 and serving them all better.

That’s what I would love and maybe I’d go back to being a teacher if that was the case.

KW: I would love that, too. I was a secondary teacher and they do have models in the secondary setting that are effective.

A differentiated or distributed leadership model allows for multiple entry points into the classroom. There is a Lead Teacher, an experienced instructional expert, who supports the academic content and pedagogical decisions for the team. There are also novice or apprentice educators who may be completing their student teaching experience or in their first year as a classroom teacher. Then, depending on the needs of the students, additional experts are added to the team, including social workers, technology specialists, reading interventionists, etc.

And the talents of all of these caring adults are in the service of a shared roster of students. It allows for not just sharing responsibility but giving students access to special expertise with multiple adults. It also creates a wider web of ownership, buy-in, and support for the group of students, which I think ultimately lends itself to elevating outcomes for kids and education as a whole. You’ve got more people who are committed to the success of a group of students.

What are some considerations associated with implementing this model?

KW: Implementing a differentiated staffing model requires rethinking the traditional model of a classroom. It is not just adding more adults to the same structures. And making big shifts like this necessitates professional learning. That’s really important, not just for the members of that team, but for instructional leaders at the site level. At the district level, you have to have a deep understanding, from a human resource position, of what this looks like. You have to redesign what human resources looks like within the district, so there’s professional learning there. There’s professional learning for the roles that exist for the lead teacher in the model and all the other people.

There needs to be an intentional understanding of individual roles and how they support their partners in the team, and how they support kids. The other thing that I think is a challenge in this model is evaluation. There are some traditional barriers to this model that would that need to be considered and need to be thought of because the way we traditionally evaluate one-teacher–one-classroom student outcomes can become an obstacle in thinking if we’ve got to really be redesigning not just staffing but systems and structures.

GW: I can imagine that another piece is related to the finances and compensation. Rethinking what you spend on salaries—which is a large portion of any school’s budget—and how that might be redistributed. We know that in the Opportunity Culture model that’s how they approach that. The teacher who takes on more responsibilities as a multi-classroom level lead teacher does earn more than somebody who has a different level of responsibility and a different kind of role, but it’s a redistribution of the resources you already have, not adding more.

How long does it take to implement a differentiated staffing model?

GW: There’s at least a year’s planning to get all of the details addressed to prepare for the change. Like you said, it’s not an inconsequential undertaking. We’re not tweaking the edges. We’re changing the fundamental structure of a school but also still working within the parameters of the existing school. We’re not building a brand new school where the building is going to be differently configured to support this. You’re still working within your existing school structure. What that does change is that students may move around between classrooms. You may combine a group of kids to be 60 instead of 30 and then split them into small groups.

There’s just a lot more flexibility, but that requires planning and professional learning to understand how to implement those changes, and you also need to take time to assess the staff you have, and their qualifications and strengths and expertise areas. Once you’ve mapped that out, you can have a sense of how you’re reconfiguring and where you may have gaps.

KW: I think a year is a good estimate and I believe that you can plan and establish expectations in that year for the people who will be participating. It’s a culture shift and you really want people to be positioned in the right way for it to be effective. Typically, at the schools I’ve been working with, they’ll pilot it at a grade level and then they’ll do some tweaking. Then, that grade level team can help to onboard another grade level team because you want family and community buy-in to the process. It’s not something that parents are used to, so if they say, “Who’s your teacher?” And their children responds, “Well today, it was Ms. Smith and in math, it was someone else,” parents need to be prepared for that answer.

What is the cost associated with implementing differentiated staffing?

KW: In the Next Education Workforce model, Arizona State University says that it’s cost neutral, but in our recent conversations with participating districts, because they do have some grant funding to build professional learning, they’re acknowledging that there are some startup costs. It’s not necessarily in addition to what you might already be budgeting for professional learning, but you need to know that you are dedicating funds to this process. Whether that exceeds your typical funding for teacher professional learning needs to be determined.

In some cases, they haven’t figured out the funding and some districts have been giving stipends to lead teachers in a way that is a little less sustainable, so there could be bumpy roads depending on how it’s implemented. But essentially, it should be something that can be cost-neutral. You’re redistributing your overall funds to support the model and we have seen that happen successfully.

What are the benefits of this model?

KW: In the first phase of this distributed leadership model, we conducted a literature scan to see what outcomes look like. While we didn’t find a lot of student outcome data, there’s a lot of outcome data around teacher retention, teacher efficacy, morale and confidence, and building new teacher expertise, which all we know all lead to improved student outcomes. What we see most overwhelmingly is that teachers want to teach in schools that have teams.

We found during COVID that two things people liked the least were isolation and lack of flexibility. They didn’t like being isolated, but they did like the newfound flexibility. These models address both of those essential human needs—you’re no longer isolated and there’s much more flexibility, not only for the educators but also for the students.

GW: So I will say on this student outcomes, Opportunity Culture has done some research on the multi-classroom leader model. Teachers working in that model moved students from the 50th percentile of student learning growth to the 77th percentile, on average. That’s an extra half year of learning for students each year.

KW: If you’re distributing for content knowledge and for expertise, then your kids are getting the best instruction that can be offered at that grade level.

GW: And you have opened a whole set of things—multiple pathways into the profession, more support and coaching, a more sustainable workload, job-embedded professional development, opportunities for leadership and growth, and specialty. With a sustainable workload and pay that is commensurate with the work, differentiated staffing has the potential to make the profession more attractive and allows us to have a more dynamic model of teaching and a more dynamic model for compensation than we currently have.

KW: Differentiated staffing makes teaching manageable. We need to face the fact that teaching can be an impossible task. With the current model, in a lot of places where teachers are needed the most, it’s just more than one human being can possibly do. That’s why teachers burn out.

GW: According to a study by Richard Ingersoll, about 44 percent of teachers leave within the first five years and about half of all teacher turnover takes place in 25 percent of our public schools.

KW: A lot of times, it’s because they don’t feel successful and supported. According to the Learning Policy Institute, compensation isn’t even one of the top three reasons educators leave the profession. They cite [a] lack of support for new teachers and challenging working conditions as having greater impacts on teacher retention than compensation. I think people know to some degree what a teacher makes when they choose the profession, and if they feel valued and successful and they have camaraderie and a team, those things go a long way to making teaching attractive.

KW: Another benefit of the model is that it allows for [an] apprenticeship. Right now, we expect a first-year teacher to do the exact same job as a 10-year teacher and there’s no real space for growth and learning. Differentiated staffing allows a teacher to grow into the profession and become the expert that they ultimately will be. It doesn’t require you to be an expert from the very first day that you’re in the classroom, which I think also helps students. Students are getting access to these excited, apprentice, newly-graduated educators, as well as tenured, seasoned educators.

GW: What you’re describing is like a medical residency model or a fellowship. So, right now, I’m a fellow and I’m still apprenticing and learning with the chief of a specialty area, and I am not expected to be an expert.

KW: Often, we call those year one-to-three teachers “provisionary teachers,” and often they’re not given additional supports and their workload isn’t any different from tenured and experienced teachers.. They’re doing the same job as an experienced teacher and we’re just checking in to see if they’re good or bad. There’s no advantage to a new teacher to be probationary. In this model, there is, because you really have the opportunity to learn from a wealth of experts.

GW: Right now, you can be a new teacher with 144 students and six class periods, and only one prep and lunch break during the day. In fact, one of the consistently identified factors that contribute to new teachers leaving their current school, district, or the profession overall is that they receive very difficult teaching assignments and heavy teaching loads.

KW: This really prevents that practice because now expertise is distributed, and all students have access to every bit of expertise of a whole team of people.

GW: All that said, there are challenges to implementing this model. It is a big cultural shift. It’s not like you’re starting over with a clean slate, opening a new school with the new model. When you do decide to make the change, you’ll have to overcome the mindset of people who think, “I know what school looks like because, during my entire career as a student, this is what school looked like.” You have to figure out how to break that mental model for kids, teachers, parents, and community members—everybody whoever went to school—and then get them comfortable with what the new model looks like and how it works.

KW: You have to have a change agent as a leader and that’s not always the case. That’s not necessarily how we train our principals and assistant principals. We’re really good at education and sustaining the status quo and layering on to the system that’s already in place instead of redesigning and thinking outside the box.

KW: I was thinking back to the benefit for students. There’s a real equity benefit because, in most schools, not all kids did get access to high-quality teachers. This spreads that wealth much more fairly around the building. But it could also be a barrier to equity. You can’t restrict this model only to high-functioning districts where you’ve got principals and superintendents all on the same page because where we really need to be focused on [is] retaining and attracting high-quality teachers and distributing expertise in high-need areas.

This is the third in a series of four blog posts on teacher compensation. These posts address issues raised during a Teacher Compensation Roundtable held in Washington, DC, in November 2022. The event brought together educators, researchers, policy experts, and other leaders to discuss addressing teacher shortages through innovations in teacher compensation. 

Other Blog Posts in the Money Matters: Conversations About Teacher Compensation Series:

• Now is the Time to Increase Teacher Compensation. Insights From Sabrina Laine, Chief Program Officer at WestEd
• Busting the Myths About Teacher Compensation and the Teaching Profession

A key goal of CIFR is to help Part C state agency staff improve their capacity to collect and report special education fiscal data. The in-person IFF in Atlanta, May 9–11, supports this goal by bringing Part C staff together with their colleagues, leading experts in special education fiscal data, and representatives of the federal Office of Special Education Programs who provide grants to states each year for their Part C programs. Through structured learning, sharing, and problem-solving sessions, the IFF creates opportunities for state staff to identify and discuss challenges and enhance their capacity to collect and report high-quality fiscal data.

The conference theme, “Purpose-Driven Data: Putting the ‘Why’ Into Fiscal Processes,” is perfectly suited to an in-person format so participants can focus together—and draw inspiration from one another—on why it’s important to help states use their IDEA fiscal data.

As WestEd’s Leslie Fox, CIFR Part C technical assistance co-lead, puts it well in a recent video, what states do with their data to make decisions about how to use Part C funds has real implications for children and families. “While IDEA fiscal oversight can seem administrative and bureaucratic at times, the IDEA federal grant award is first and foremost about helping infants and toddlers with developmental delays and disabilities,” she says.

CIFR marked another milestone this spring on the IDEA Part B side, which funds services for school-age children with disabilities ages 3 through 21, with an in-person convening of its “New to Fiscal” community of practice (CoP). At the end of March, more than two dozen Part B state staff in their roles for less than a year and a half attended a two-day training in Washington, DC. CIFR’s goal was to provide attendees with the technical knowledge and relationships with peers and technical assistance providers to be successful in their new positions and develop capacity to ensure the ongoing collection and reporting of high-quality fiscal data. This “New to Fiscal” community of practice is one of four Part B topical CoPs that CIFR hosts throughout the year. In addition, planning has begun for our next Part B IDEA Fiscal Forum in 2024.

Along with hosting national convenings and communities of practice, CIFR provides a broad range of universal, targeted, and intensive technical assistance to states and maintains an extensive online library of tools and resources to build the capacity of states to meet their obligation to ensure appropriate use and oversight of IDEA funds.

Learn more about CIFR.

Designing High School Science Learning to Reach All Students 

To achieve the ambitious goals set by the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and similar standards, today’s high school students need access to carefully designed learning experiences. Authentic Science Experiences: Designing High School Science Learning to Reach All Students explores several core principles that inform the design and facilitation of more effective and meaningful science learning experiences.

The resource, developed by WestEd’s NextGenScience, highlights five features of authentic science experiences and underlying research that support the design and implementation of meaningful and enriching science learning for high school students. It also includes a series of vignettes that illustrate what these features look like in a variety of high school science experiences from across the nation.

The five core features highlighted in the resource include:

• Students integrate skills with core knowledge of science and engineering professions.
• Students’ interests, culture, identities, and experiences are positioned as fundamental assets in the learning process.
• Students use science to explain the world around them and solve problems that matter to society.
• Students learn by engaging with both peers and adults.
• Students engaging in a variety of assessment processes that showcase ongoing learning and promote confidence.

The resource illustrates how science in a school environment connects better to science as a profession and the science we use in our everyday lives, making the field of science more accessible, relevant, and meaningful to students.

DOWNLOAD THE FULL RESOURCE

NGSS Instruction As A Powerful Lever for Equitable Learning

From 2014 to 2020, the California NGSS K–8 Early Implementation Initiative supported several K–8 school districts in implementing the Next Generation Science Standards.

This brief describes key results and takeaways from WestEd’s evaluation of the initiative, which found that NGSS teaching:

• Fosters strong student engagement and deep learning for K–8 students, particularly for students who have often been inadequately reached through traditional science instruction.
• Has a natural synergy with English language arts (ELA) and math and supports language development.

The brief also discusses how the NGSS engages students more deeply and integrates with other subjects more effectively—and why ensuring that all students have access to effective NGSS instruction is critical.

DOWNLOAD THE POLICY BRIEF

Promoting Inclusion and Engagement in STEM Learning

Participation in out-of-school time (OST) programs, especially in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), has proven to be beneficial for youth, particularly youth who are underserved. These benefits include promoting academic success, health and well-being, and identity development. Many OST programs and educators seek support for how to promote STEM learning with specific youth audiences, such as Indigenous learners, emergent multilingual learners, and learners experiencing differing physical and/or sensory abilities.

This guide is designed to provide practical strategies and guidance for OST professionals—including educators, program directors, administrators, curriculum developers, professional learning providers, and education researchers—who provide STEM learning activities to youth outside of a formal classroom setting. This guide reflects the collaborative work of WestEd and Northern Arizona University (NAU) through the Planetary Learning that Advances the Nexus of Engineering, Technology, and Science (PLANETS) program, with support from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

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Subscribe to the E-Bulletin

Stay informed about WestEd’s research, resources, services, events, and career opportunities by subscribing to our E-Bulletin. Our April 2023 issue explores how educators can provide high-quality science education to all learners. Topics include:

• Maximizing Instructional Time for Science
• Building Affirming Science Learning Environments
• NGSS Instruction Supports Science Equitable Learning
• Leading Voices Spotlight on Dr. Sharon Nelson-Barber
• Culturally Valid and Shared Measures for Indigenous Students
• Creating Authentic Science Experiences for High School Students
• Why Integrating Science and Math Education Makes Sense

VIEW THE LATEST E-BULLETIN 

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How is your state, district, or school working to provide high-quality science instruction? Join the conversation with us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

In the United States, approaches to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) instruction are aligned with English-speaking, White middle-class norms. STEM courses rarely reflect consideration for the unique backgrounds of Indigenous learners. Because of this devaluing of local cultural, linguistic, and community traditions, whole communities are left behind, resulting in learners’ exclusion from advanced educational and employment tracks.

Dr. Sharon Nelson-Barber, Director of Culture and Language in STEM Education at WestEd, aims to change this trajectory. She and her team explore the ways in which students’ cultural backgrounds influence how they learn STEM subjects. Based on the team’s findings, they have developed innovative STEM education and assessment methods that shift relationships between Indigenous ways of learning and Western educational practices.

Integrating Indigenous and Minoritized Cultures in STEM

Ensuring that STEM courses are compatible with the linguistic needs and unique cultural backgrounds of all students is of utmost importance to Dr. Nelson-Barber. She believes that finding ways to support diverse teachers and learners to bridge worldviews will help learners realize their academic potential while also enriching the STEM community with a broader range of perspectives.

Minoritized groups such as Indigenous populations are still widely underrepresented in scientific and engineering fields. This is largely because most STEM education courses in the United States implicitly represent White, mainstream cultural perspectives, with little regard for diverse concepts and knowledge systems. Many students from minoritized backgrounds, including many Indigenous students, do not “see” themselves or their ways of knowing represented in conventional academic curricula. Such curricula, which typically reflect cultural values and heritage that these students do not share, also effectively perpetuate the systemic inequalities that disenfranchise them.

Working With Indigenous Communities

Dr. Nelson-Barber, of Rappahannock Indian and African American descent, has lifelong personal and professional experience with this work. As Director of Culture and Language in STEM Education at WestEd, she has dedicated most of her career to better understanding how students’ cultural backgrounds influence how they make sense of STEM subjects. Her research proposes valuable methods for incorporating diverse perspectives, values, and languages in STEM teaching and assessment practices. Common misconceptions that reduce the validity of assessment outcomes include underestimating students’ English proficiency, overestimating their heritage language proficiency, and lowering academic expectations as a result.

In spite of colonization and aggressive assimilation intended to extinguish heritage languages and identities, Indigenous communities continue to maintain knowledge systems that are coherent and complete unto themselves, including values, norms, and lifeways. As noted by Dr. Nelson-Barber and her colleague Dr. Zanette Johnson in 2016, when mainstream assumptions are encoded into educational norms, this poses challenges for Indigenous students, who must be the ones to bridge the gap in areas such as community values, worldview, environmental knowledge, socioeconomic status, and teacher/student roles.

It is profoundly unjust that Indigenous students have had to bear the constant weight of adapting to U.S. conventional norms in order to succeed in educational spaces. Educational researchers and instructors must now be the ones to shoulder responsibility for expanding the range of learning opportunities that are accessible to students of all backgrounds.

To better understand how students with distinct cultural backgrounds approach and relate to STEM disciplines, Dr. Nelson-Barber engages with educators, elders, and other local knowledge keepers. These individuals have a deep understanding of their communities and insights about how their cultural values can be incorporated in instruction to positively impact students’ learning.

“Our work highlights the need to work side by side with community members who carry the linguistic, cultural, and institutional knowledge of their communities,” says Dr. Nelson-Barber. “My team approaches this research knowing that the community members are the real experts in their domain; we each lend our unique perspectives about valued outcomes.”

STEM Interventions for Indigenous Students

With classrooms becoming increasingly diverse, and technology and science advancing at an increasingly rapid pace, educators must turn to local excellence for assistance in adapting academic approaches that will better equip students to face future challenges. Dr. Nelson-Barber and her team regularly codevelop and try out new teaching approaches side by side with Indigenous community members and educators.

Drawing upon research to design effective STEM instruction is important, but best practices identified on the basis of research with culturally “mainstream” students may have limited utility in informing STEM instruction for Indigenous students. These so-called “best practices” often work best for White middle-class learners, since they do not consider the students’ linguistic and cultural backgrounds, nor do these education methods draw on beliefs, values, or goals outside the mainstream or require family or community involvement.

Over a 3-year period, Dr. Nelson-Barber and Dr. Johnson interviewed practicing Diné educators who were earning master’s degrees and Native language teaching certifications. The researchers learned about the extent to which some “proven” research-based STEM education methods actually limited students’ academic performance because it suppressed their cultural values and vitality. Diné teachers also held that involving families in their children’s schooling was a beneficial approach for their students, though it does not necessarily apply to students from White majority backgrounds. This could be a reflection of lingering fallout from the colonial ways of “educating” Indigenous people, which involved aggressive learning programs that were intended to erase Native cultures, replacing them with those of the colonizers, as well as differences in cultural values.

The forced removal of youth from homes and communities to boarding schools interrupted the natural acquisition of language and culture for generations. Returning youth, denied their language, could no longer interact with grandparents and community elders, removing important cultural learning, and directly contributing to the erasure of cultural and community knowledge. Assimilationist practices embedded in current school reforms continue to disregard students’ Native languages, cultural differences, dialectal protocols, cultural traumas, and social hierarchies.

As a result of this program, administrators have been learning about the many benefits of incorporating heritage language and local ways of knowing in everyday teaching practices. The Diné teachers described ways that they infused their instruction with “context-adaptive” approaches. Examples include linking scientific knowledge with activities that are part of students’ cultural heritage, such as sheep herding and weather prediction, or integrating local nonverbal and visual communication styles and allowing students to speak in heritage language. All of these methods contributed to improved long-term learning and knowledge consolidation.

STEM has always been robustly alive in their world of everyday activity—we want Indigenous learners’ knowledge to be valued, visible, and valid within the fields of STEM study and practice. And that vision begins now, with teachers crafting classroom learning that bridges knowledge systems and opens generative space for cultural identity, language, and practice within school.

Context-Adaptive Learning Methods

In 2016, Dr. Nelson-Barber and her colleagues started adapting technology-based science learning tools in close collaboration with Indigenous educators from the Navajo Nation and Hawai‘i. The educators explained the deep impact that historical trauma associated with colonization still has on how Indigenous peoples experience formal education in public schools. “Many of my Native colleagues talk about the heavy psychological price they paid growing up when asked to leave identity at the classroom threshold in exchange for an education,” says Dr. Nelson-Barber. “They needed to become someone else—someone who would step up to learn, and speak, and behave the ‘right’ way.”

Over several years of research, Dr. Nelson-Barber and her team identified context-adaptive methods for conducting research and teaching students in culturally diverse learning environments. One method involved adapting FieldScope, an online citizen science tool to support project-based learning outdoors. Teachers developed STEM instruction that reflected Indigenous cultural values, including a respect for the deep meaning of land, and incorporated an understanding of spiritual relationships among people and the land and natural resources.

Dr. Nelson-Barber and her colleagues devised a new instructional aid to support the lesson adaptations: a descriptive rubric that details key aspects of teaching in Indigenous cultural contexts. The tool organizes teacher knowledge around eight crucial factors for learners in Indigenous settings: contextualization, critical self-reflection, cultural values, land-based and nature-based learning experiences, the preservation of Native languages, family and community bonds, cognitive complexity, and authentic assessment. It delineates strategies and communication styles that are more relatable for students since they create space for weaving with local values and traditions.

With the adaptations to the FieldScope platform and a new instructional model in hand, educators of Indigenous learners have a new research-based resource to help students make sense of scientific concepts in familiar and culturally relevant ways.

Culturally Appropriate Assessments

In addition to supporting teachers as they augment teaching with innovative new context-adaptive teaching approaches and resources, Dr. Nelson-Barber and her colleagues have been devising more valid methods to assess STEM learning of students from Indigenous and minority backgrounds.

Through her collaborations with Indigenous educators, Dr. Nelson-Barber knows the importance of recognizing meaningful connections between topics covered in class and teachers’ own Native heritage, ancestors, land, culture, and communities. Toward this goal of understanding how learners bridge worldviews, the work is premised on the principle that there are different cultural representations and ways of understanding science. This ultimately creates space for students to understand how they can apply what they have learned within their cultural context and to potentially envision a career in STEM.

Dr. Nelson-Barber is also developing alternative STEM testing tools that account for linguistic differences. For instance, as many existing tests have unnecessary syntactic complexity, she has been developing syntactically straightforward tests to reliably assess middle school and high school students’ understanding of mathematics and science concepts.

Tackling Glocal Challenges 

The recent work carried out by Dr. Nelson-Barber and her colleagues will have far-reaching implications for the academic development of students from Indigenous communities and potentially to other minoritized groups as well. In addition to identifying context-adaptive STEM teaching and assessment methods, which teachers can use to account for differences in language, culture, heritage, and values, some of her projects are directly supporting students from Indigenous communities.

Dr. Nelson-Barber is currently involved in studying “science identity” development among university students in geoscience research programs focused on coastal science. This project engages learners from the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Marshall Islands. Over the course of 5 years, numerous middle school, high school, college-level, and graduate students from these islands are participating in a variety of programs by conducting authentic, original STEM research alongside university faculty. The project has supported summer camps, graduate training courses, professional development workshops, scientific conferences, and other programming all aimed at welcoming islanders to the STEM community.

This project, along with numerous other projects by Dr. Nelson-Barber and her collaborators, will ultimately help to build a more diverse STEM workforce, supporting Indigenous communities as they tackle the climate crisis and future environmental challenges using approaches that center different perspectives. Toward this goal, Dr. Nelson-Barber also cofounded POLARIS (Pivotal Opportunities to Learn, Advance, and Research Indigenous Systems)—a research and development network that encourages a deep transformation in STEM education, promotes the preservation of Indigenous values and cultures, and addresses climate change and other local and global (glocal) scientific challenges.

Dr. Nelson-Barber offers this reflection in closing: “For millennia, the Indigenous communities we work with have been engaged in learning science, engineering, math, and technology; sustainability and knowledge of the environment are at the core of these learners’ life experiences. We, as educators, are learning from them about how to support learners in bringing their valuable knowledge to the fore—and reshaping the discipline of ‘science’ so that it is more diverse, accessible, and relevant. STEM has always been robustly alive in their world of everyday activity—we want Indigenous learners’ knowledge to be valued, visible, and valid within the fields of STEM study and practice. And that vision begins now, with teachers crafting classroom learning that bridges knowledge systems and opens generative space for cultural identity, language, and practice within school.”

This summer marks twenty years of Quality Teaching for English Learners (QTEL) Summer Institutes, a professional learning opportunity in which educators from around the world gather to learn how to engage English Learners in high-challenge, high-support education that comes with high expectations. The goal is to teach English Learners in a way that allows them to thrive in school, in their careers, and as highly valued community members.

QTEL focuses on developing educator expertise to support elementary and secondary English Learners’ development of conceptual, analytic, and language practices in disciplinary subject areas. Teams of educators attend the institutes to learn and experience the QTEL approach, which is a powerful, strengths-based framework for teaching and learning developed around five guiding principles for teaching:

• Sustain Academic Rigor
• Hold High Expectations
• Engage Students in Quality Interactions
• Sustain a Language Focus
• Develop Quality Curriculum

These principles can be witnessed in classrooms where teachers apply the framework learned in the Institutes. In many classes that implement the QTEL approach, students from different parts of the world engage in academic and intellectual discourse. Students participate in sustained dialogue—talking, debating, critiquing, and explaining concepts and ideas to one another.

Teachers design the lessons to be of interest and relevance to students’ lived experiences, have high expectations of the students, and provide them with the supports students learn to expect in order to succeed beyond classroom walls.

Accelerating Student Learning After an Extended Absence

This year the Institutes come at a critical time in education. During the COVID-19 pandemic many English Learner students and their teachers did not receive the services and supports they needed to fully engage in remote learning.

Some did not have access to the necessary technology for distance learning and some lived in areas that lacked accessible internet connections (Reed et al. 2022). Some students experienced tremendous trauma related to losing a family member or losing economic stability (Yunsoo Park et al. 2020).

Now that schools are up and running at full capacity, educators are eager to get English Learners engaged again and to find their voice and agency as they navigate through a growing and increasingly complex world. This sense of urgency was present at the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) Annual Conference held in Portland, Oregon. In his keynote address to a packed room of educators at the conference, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said:

I don’t have to tell you that we are at the doorstep of a teacher shortage crisis in our country. This is even more palpable in hard-to-fill areas like Bilingual education.

That’s why, last month, we announced our first-ever grants—totaling over $18 million—under the Augustus Hawkins program to increase high-quality teacher preparation programs for teachers of color and multilingual teachers who are uniquely situated to reach our diverse student population. And every single one of those grantees incorporated a priority to produce more multilingual and bilingual teachers into their plans for these funds (Cardona, 2023).

Nearly 2,000 NABE participants attended a special keynote given by WestEd’s Aída Walqui, who started the QTEL initiative and grew it into the signature program it is today. Walqui has spent her career elevating the education of English Learners. She is now the Principal Investigator for and Director of the National Research and Development Center for Improving the Education of English Learners in Secondary Schools at WestEd.

In Walqui’s talk Quality and Equity in the Education of English Learners: Our Reciprocal Responsibility she explored the tenets of QTEL’s approach to developing English Learners. “Students don’t need to be ready to engage in very complex texts,” she said, “Readiness is created by support and engagement.”  She also spoke about curriculum design for English Learners:

Most of our curricula are linear. But instead, curricula need to spiral… [A]mbitious, dialogic exchanges have to be at the center of the enterprise. If you walk into a class and the teacher talks and talks and talks, something is really wrong, and no learning is taking place. (Walqui, 2023)

She says teachers can frame an activity for students, “But then teachers need to cede.”

Promoting an Equitable and Quality Education for English Learners

Teachers and leaders know the vast cultural and linguistic assets English Learners bring to classrooms. Educators also understand the tremendous challenges these students face and the critical need for reallocating opportunities and resources for each students’ learning needs and ultimate success.

This summer QTEL Institute participants will be able to expand their expertise. In the spirit of collaboration they will be invited to bring the issues they face in their classrooms and schools so that they can work with QTEL’s expert facilitators and their peers and colleagues to find solutions that strengthen their own expertise to improve outcomes for English Learners.

The Institutes will take place in Oahu, Hawaii; Santa Cruz, California; and Washington, DC. Educators can take courses focused on elementary or secondary literacy, secondary mathematics, curriculum design, and leadership. Each Institute will feature a keynote address from renowned scholars Amanda Kibler, Nelson Flores, Francisco Jimenez, and our own Dr. Walqui.

Are you interested in growing your expertise in engaging English Learners in deep, generative learning? Visit the QTEL Summer Institutes event page to learn more.

Sharon Sáez is Senior Partnership Development Director for WestEd’s English Learners and Migrant Education Services team. Sáez supports the scale-up of professional learning offerings by creating partnerships and contributing to the team’s vital role in educational recovery efforts to ensure full and equal participation of English Learner students in their learning and growth.

References

Reed, S., Hurtt, A., Hibel, J., & Garrett, D. (2022, May). Serving English Learners during the COVID-19 pandemic. Policy Analysis for California Education. https://www.edpolicyinca.org/publications/serving-english-learners-duringcovid-19-pandemic

Yunsoo Park, Y., Nakamura J., Rush, J., & Fuxman, S. (2020, June). Supporting students experiencing trauma during the COVID-19 pandemic. Institute of Educational Sciences, REL Appalachia. https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/Products/Region/appalachia/Blog/-89748

Cardona, M. (2023, February). Remarks by U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona at the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) 52nd Annual International Bilingual and Bicultural Education Conference [Keynote speech transcript]. U.S. Department of Education. https://www.ed.gov/news/speeches/remarks-us-secretary-education-miguel-cardona-national-association-bilingual-education-nabe-52nd-annual-international-bilingual-and-bicultural-education-conference

Walqui, A. (2023, February) Remarks by Aida Walqui at the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) 52nd Annual International Bilingual and Bicultural Education Conference

Additional Sources

Kibler, A., Valdez, G., & Walqui, A. (2021) Reconceptualizing the Role of Critical Dialogue in American Classrooms: Promoting Equity through Dialogic Education. Routledge Research in Education.

Walqui, A., & Van Lier, L. (2010). Scaffolding the academic success of adolescent English language learners: A pedagogy of promise. WestEd.

In this blog post, the second in the Money Matters: Conversations About Teacher Compensation Series, Gretchen Weber, Senior Managing Director at WestEd, and Ellen Sherratt, Teacher Salary Project Board President, address some of the myths around teachers’ compensation.

Myth 1: Teachers don’t work full time and they get summers off, so they should be paid less than similarly situated professionals.

Gretchen Weber (GW): Some data points to typical teacher​s​ work​ing​ about 54 hours a week, and one in 10 work more than 65 hours. If you take the amount of work teachers do during the school year and equalize it out across a calendar year, they work far more hours than just 40 in a week but don’t get paid for doing that.​ We often hear a follow up, “What about other professionals who also work more than 40 hours a week? That’s just what being a professional entails.” I’ll point you back to the salary discrepancy, to begin with. So, for teachers, it can feel​​ almost like working a full-time job for part-time pay.

Ellen Sherrat (ES): I’d add a couple of things to that. One is, that as a nation, we’re really trying to recruit and retain more teachers of color right now to better reflect the student population.  Gretchen, you noted that teachers work 54 hours a week on average during the school year. That number is 63 hours on average for Black teachers and most likely reflects the fact that teachers of color are in schools that have more challenging conditions and fewer resources to help address them.

Along those lines, the conditions under which teachers are working are incredibly intense. In the book, Teachers Have it Easy, Ninive Calegari, Dave Eggers, and Dan Moulthrop put it best when they said a teacher’s hour is not comparable to, for example, an architect’s hour. Teachers are often so busy keeping 40 students at a time safe and attended​ to, not to mention engaged and learning,​ that they can go six hours at a stretch without a moment even to go to the bathroom.

They also note that most occupations allow workers to control their own time at work—to drift off in thought, to surf the web, to get coffee anytime they wish. That’s not so with teaching—a profession that holds its members legally responsible for the well-being of a room full of children for up to seven hours at a time. The intensity of teaching is so great that teachers are the most burnt-out working group according to the 2022 Gallup Poll. Fifty-three percent of K–12 teachers report that they’re always or almost always burned out at work.  That far outpaces other professional groups.

GW: I want to add that we can’t escape talking about the last three years. The pandemic certainly exacerbated all of what you just described—the intensity of the conditions, the burnout, the larger numbers of hours Black teachers put in, teachers making up for the under-resourcing of schools.

​​A recent study​ coming out of the pandemic found that teachers were 40 percent more likely to report anxiety symptoms than even healthcare workers. Teachers had more anxiety because of the things they were dealing with during that time, on top of their regular tremendous workload.

I also want to comment on the summer argument. Most school years aren’t nine months anymore. Most school years either begin after Labor Day and go through the end of June or ​run ​from the end of May until early- to mid-August.  A “summer” is more like two months, and in that two-month period teachers are often fulfilling professional development or other licensure requirements. Some teachers have coursework​ during that time​ because they’re pursuing advanced degrees. They’re preparing new curricula, serving on district committees . . . all those types of activities tend to get crammed into these two months of the summer, often for no additional pay.

Myth 2: Education budgets are tight, and we can’t afford to pay teachers more.

ES: The fact that the top-performing school systems do manage to afford to increase teacher pay is proof that it can be affordable if we choose to prioritize and do it. Significantly increasing teacher salaries seems an expensive proposition but it’s also expensive to continue on the road that we’re on now. We currently spend $1.3 billion annually on remedial college coursework because students were underprepared. Either because they had no teachers with adequate mastery of some subjects (because in some places we’re relying on long-term substitutes or teachers who didn’t even have access to certain coursework), or because we’re relying on underqualified teachers because of teacher shortages caused by very low salaries.

In 1969, two-thirds of the public school budget went toward staffing costs and teacher salaries.  If the same proportion of school funding went towards teacher salaries, today teachers would be paid an average of $140,000 a year, instead of an average of $65,000.

GW: Also, several states, including Delaware, Maryland, and New Mexico, have either passed or proposed legislation increasing starting salaries for teachers to $60,000​​​​. ​Since January 2021, 25 states have enacted or proposed legislation to increase teacher compensation; though for some, it is a very minor increase or more focused on specific roles. ​And Congress is considering legislation that would raise the minimum teacher salary nationwide to $60,000. ​H​ow do you afford not to do this when you know that a highly effective teacher in the classroom is the number one school-based factor in student learning? And student learning is one of the major goals of school. Also, we know that low salaries make it really hard to attract people into the profession and to retain others.

ES: And when people in positions of leadership and who have voice in the field just write it off as impossible and unaffordable that is exactly what makes it so. ​     ​

GW: We’re at a point where teacher shortages are really hitting a crisis level. It’s a combination of a lot of things including ​not enough people entering the profession and preparation program enrollments dropping​, which has been happening for about a decade.

ES: It’s dropped by a third over the last decade.

GW: Right, so now we’re trying to fill openings long-term and using subs and provisionally credentialed or licensed certified teachers and leaving vacancies unfilled. ​In some places, the shortage of teachers is so acute ​​students are expected to learn without one. ​How do you effectively educate your students to make them prepared for post-high school experiences including college in this environment?

ES: What message does it send to children about the value of ​them and the value of their ​education?

Myth 3: It’s not that difficult to be a teacher. Anyone can do it.

GW: Let’s start with the fact that to be a teacher of record, you have to be able to demonstrate the skills and knowledge for effective classroom practice. While the coursework, field experience, and other requirements vary by state, the one constant is you need a license. To get it, you need to have a bachelor’s degree, and acquiring your state license often requires one or two exams and/or portfolio evaluation and demonstrating subject matter content knowledge about the things you will teach. Then you have to know how to teach, so pedagogical content knowledge is required to be able to do things like predict common mistakes students will make in their learning or manage your classroom in a way that promotes learning. Then, often the third part of the license is a classroom performance assessment, so we know that you can actually work with students. Renewing that license involves professional development and sometimes teachers are required to make advancements in licensure. ​This is similar to other professions which also require a state license to practice—therapists, accountants, engineers, architects, nurses, lawyers for example.​

About a decade ago, states were strengthening entry requirements to the field to ensure high-quality educators, but over the last couple of years, about a dozen or so states have ​been amending or are considering amending​ their teacher certification rules for licensure. Some are changing criteria for it, others are expanding the qualifying score on state licensing tests, some are dropping state licenses altogether. I would argue that lowering the bar for what it means to be a highly effective teacher at the same time we have many students who are several grade levels behind in instruction because of the pandemic doesn’t add up. ​There’s a risk, then, of having less​ qualified, less experienced, less practiced teachers entering the profession based on the licensure requirements who are teaching students with greater needs.

ES: Because of the learning loss and mental health crisis due to the pandemic, we need teachers who do more than meet those state requirements (requirements which you mentioned are falling) but who are incredible mentors and fully dedicated and available to their students.  We need people who have tremendous patience, passion for helping people, the ability to think out-of-the-box, conscientiousness, compassion, flexibility, a sense of humor, strong organizational skills. If you’re going to engage students in the way that they really need right now to be on a path to success we need to pay teachers enough so that they can be happy and well themselves, and ​​not have to work second jobs that distract them from being there for their students.

Here’s a passage from Teachers Have It Easy that I think speaks so well to this issue: “A teacher is also a moral force. The expression ‘pillar of the community’ has no more apt application. It’s no easy task. . . . Few other professions require their members to act with courtesy, with ethical precision, with honor and patience all at all times, inside school or out. Because teachers are role models, there is no margin for error in their personal and public behavior. The teacher must also inspire. The best teachers instill in their students a desire to do great things, to crave learning, to learn to achieve. A teacher, therefore, must be a forward-looking and likely happy individual who is prepared to keep offering an optimistic future vision so students can keep working towards that future vision.” I think that is just so brilliant. What we need right now is teachers who are well compensated, happy, prepared, supported people available for their students. And that is what students need at all times, but especially right now to get past this crisis of learning loss and mental health.

GW: I’ll go a little deeper from there and talk about the complexity of what teaching and learning require. Ellen, you spoke so beautifully about the attributes of the people.  I think it’s important that we think about this notion of a profession. I want to articulate the things that make a profession and then we can talk about how that applies to teaching because people often say, “Oh, you just get up and go to school and stand there and tell the kids some information, read from the book, follow the plan in the textbook. Anybody can do that as long as you’re a literate adult.”

This is one of my favorite quotes, “thinking that you can be a teacher because you went to school is like saying you could direct a blockbuster film because you went to watch ‘Star Wars.’”

Teaching is a profession. And any profession has four distinct elements. First is a clear and distinct domain of expertise. Secondly, professionals must have the ability to diagnose or assess a problem within this domain of expertise. They must be able to reason and make inferences about the problem. Finally, by using specialized knowledge and professional judgments they must be able to solve or treat the problem and take action on the ​student’​s behalf.

​​Shouldn’t we be paying teachers as the professionals they are?​

Myth 4: Teachers get excellent benefits, especially retirement benefits, so salaries don’t need to be increased.

ES: Bellwether put out a report that showed only half of teachers receive any of their pension benefits at all because you have to stay in your state school system for many, many years to reap those benefits. Only 20 percent of teachers are receiving their full pension benefits. Also, it doesn’t outweigh the low salaries—you have teachers in 43 states who are eligible for ​at least one type of government assistance ​benefits and regardless of your benefits, it’s not good to be on ​​food stamps.

I would say that Dick Starz, the MIT economist, put it best in a Brookings article where he said that the bottom line on ​​​​​​deciding whether teacher compensation is adequate is whether you’re paying enough to get a sufficiently large supply of sufficiently good employees. And if you feel like you have enough of the teachers that you need in terms of diversity and talent and everything else, then great, the compensation package is sufficient. If you don’t, and I think almost everyone would agree right now we don’t, then you’re not.

It’s just a distraction to talk about the benefits. We need to do market research with teachers on the mix of salary and benefits that would be attractive to them and educate teachers and prospective teachers about the benefits that are available. But right now, the package just isn’t compelling and that’s why we have 62 percent of parents saying that they don’t want their children to become teachers—the highest percent ever. The number one reason they say for not wanting their kids to be teachers is low salaries.

GW: What they really mean is they don’t want their kids living in their basement.

ES: Yes. Adults move in with their parents because they can’t afford rent. The Teacher Salary Project ​​​​survey in the summer of 2022 found in our unpublished open-response data that teachers in their 40s still have roommates or are still living with their parents.

GW: On the pay penalty—we know there’s about a 19 percent wage gap between teachers and other professionals.

ES: It’s actually up to 23.5 percent now.

GW: That makes our point even better. And when you add ​benefits to the equation​, the compensation penalty was 10 percent in 2019 and it’s 14.2 percent​. So, still a growing gap even with salary plus benefits factored in.​​     ​

ES: And the gap between teaching and non-teaching careers for college-educated individuals was 2.7 percent in 1993 and now it’s 14.2 percent.

GW: So, as an example, ​​registered nurses in the United States constitute the majority of the healthcare workforce and teachers—right—dominate the country’s education system. If you compare the two, last year, registered nurses on average in the U.S. earned $77,500 and nurse practitioners earned $111,000 on average. That’s compared to $65,000 for teachers. Only 9 percent of districts allow teachers—ever in their career, regardless of degree—to earn $100,000. Think about the ROI on earning advanced degrees if you’re planning to stay in teaching.

Closing Thoughts

​​​GW: The bottom line here really is the bottom line. Until we set aside these myths and commit to compensating teachers as we do similarly educated and situated professionals, we’re never going to solve the teacher shortage. ​​     ​​​​​​​​     ​​​​​​​​​​​​     ​​​​​​​     ​