The Race to the Top (RTTT) program incentivized states to use innovation for systemwide improvement of student outcomes, but little is known about how RTTT-funded innovation was sustained after the RTTT program ended. This mixed-methods study examined state and district approaches to sustaining an international innovation called "lesson…

Research shows that effective teachers are one of the most important in-school contributors to student learning. To improve low-income minority students' access to effective teaching, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched the Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching (IP) initiative in the 2009-2010 school year. The program was…

In 2018, The RAND Corporation and the American Institutes for Research (AIR) published an evaluation of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Intensive Partnerships for Effective Teaching (IP) initiative, which was designed to improve achievement among low-income minority (LIM) students. The initiative provided support for several reforms that…

In a private room at the back of a busy restaurant just outside of Tampa, Florida, drinks and appetizers went unnoticed as 12 diners sat around one large table and engaged in multiple rapid-fire conversations about professional learning. On one side of each conversation were representatives of Memphis (Tennessee) City Schools. The district was in…

Teachers are generally recognized as the schooling factor accounting for the highest proportion of student learning outcomes (Aaronson et al., 2007; Hanushek, 1986). This implies the quick and dramatic improvement in school performance observed in turnaround (TA) schools was associated with a major change in the performance of its teachers. This…

The 2009 "State Teacher Policy Yearbook" provided a comprehensive review of states' policies that impact the teaching profession. As a companion to last year's comprehensive state-by-state analysis, the 2010 edition provides each state with an individualized "Blueprint for Change," building off last year's "Yearbook"…

For five years running, the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) has tracked states' teacher policies, preparing a detailed and thorough compendium of teacher policy in the United States on topics related to teacher preparation, licensure, evaluation, career advancement, tenure, compensation, pensions and dismissal. The 2011 State Teacher…

The theme of the conference reported on here was school reform and related issues. An introductory statement, "Thoughts on School Reform," by Jerome Bruner, and a list of conference participants are followed by a group of papers on education and politics. The papers are "Reform and Partnership in Education," by Albert Shanker;…

Describes one approach to teacher leadership that views teaching, learning, and leading as synonymous, supporting this view with data from a Florida school improvement project. The Lockheed Martin/University of Central Florida Academy for Mathematics and Science is a school-university-business partnership which creates a network of school-based…

A discussion of recent trends in state educational reform stresses the importance of addressing two challenges: teaching all students higher order thinking and developing more systematic, coherent policies. The article describes the challenges, examines how state policies in the 1980s addressed them and how districts responded, and suggests future…

This document is designed to help local Florida communities and applied technology educators restructure their applied technologies programs to support development of the essential skills described in Florida's school-to-work initiatives. Among the topics discussed are the following: principles of Florida's School Improvement and Accountability…