This article puts forth a multidimensional framework for empirically testing the effects of teacher mentoring, focusing on interactions between formal mentors and novice teachers and the setting in which these interactions occur. Analyzing survey and administrative data from Chicago Public Schools with a multilevel propensity-score weighting…

This study investigates whether teaching practices of non-minorities who teach Black students has an impact on the achievement gap between Black and White students. There is a lack of awareness of culturally relevant teaching in the U.S public school system (Epstein, 2005). Per NCES (2015), 80% of public schools have a high density of Black…

This study investigates the learning of linguistic structures associated with African American English (AAE) among four non-AAE-speaking teachers of AAE-speaking students. It considers implicit and explicit learning/development of a second dialect in two novel ways. First, it focuses on the understanding of a socially-stigmatized dialect by…

The Math for All (MFA) qualitative research team approached the randomized control trial (RCT) mixed methods investigation from a "pragmatic" perspective (Cresswell and Plano-Clark, 2011), that is, the belief that multiple realities can exist and that neither a qualitative nor quantitative approach is valued over the other. Further, the…

This study follows 305 preservice teachers (PSTs) who student taught in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) in 2014-15 and were subsequently hired in CPS in 2015-16. Drawing on surveys of PSTs and their cooperating teachers (CTs) and CPS administrative data, we linked features of their preservice teacher education to three outcome measures for…

This article describes learning walks that focus on enhancing student intrinsic motivation and learning at a dual-language pre-K-8 urban public school. Descriptions in this case study are a composite based on the authors' actual experiences as well as ideas from literature and other schools. About once a week at Chicago's Talcott Fine Arts and…

Across the country, urban school districts are opting to close under-enrolled schools as a way to consolidate resources. Motivated by a reported $1 billion deficit and declining enrollments in depopulating neighborhoods, the Chicago Board of Education voted in May 2013 to close 49 elementary schools and one high school program located in an…

Policymakers have refocused attention on the school readiness of low-income, African American children. Yet, preschools, elementary schools, and families often differ in their beliefs about salient abilities. The degree of alignment among teachers and parents influences how successfully children make the transition to kindergarten. Focusing on one…

The MSUrbanSTEM fellowship program provides exemplary urban STEM teachers the opportunity to engage in transformative instructional and leadership experiences that support the advancement of their teaching practice. In this chapter, we provide a foundational examination of the development and implementation of a curriculum for this innovative…

We examine how culturally sustaining pedagogy that fosters linguistic and cultural pluralism might be taken up in writing instruction. Using data collected through semistructured interviews with nine urban elementary and middle school writing teachers, we document teachers' conceptualizations and enactments of culturally sustaining writing…

Urban school districts face a dilemma in providing professional development support for teachers in transition to the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Districts need to maximize the quality and amount of professional development within practical funding constraints. In this paper, we discuss preliminary results from a…

Why are some schools able to thrive and produce strong student outcomes, while others struggle? To answer this question, researchers have surveyed teachers and students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) since the 1990s, asking them about their schools' organizational climate and practices. From these data, researchers at the Consortium on Chicago…

Through a content analysis of the projective stories written by a randomly selected group of teachers at an all black Chicago high school, this study revealed teachers' perceptions of life at the school. The study demonstrated that ghetto teachers vary greatly in their perceptions and appraisals of their shared teaching environment, and that the…

ROLE ORIENTATIONS AMONG TEACHERS OF DIFFERENT ETHNIC AND SOCIOCULTURAL BACKGROUNDS WERE STUDIED. INVESTIGATION CENTERED ON (1) THE DISTINGUISHABLE PATTERNS OF ROLE ORIENTATION, AND (2) THE EFFECTS OF ETHNIC AND OTHER SOCIOCULTURAL VARIABLES UPON ROLE ORIENTATION. THE SAMPLE CONSISTED OF 106 SECONDARY TEACHERS, IDENTIFIED AS MEMBERS OF 1 OF 6…

The objective of the research reported here was to discover and describe two sets of categories used by teachers in perceiving and thinking about their students--one set common to all or nearly all teachers from inner-city schools with Afro-American enrollments; and the other set common to all or nearly all teachers from suburban schools with…