I hope more of the general public follow his lead and speak up for the teachers they know and respect.

...who taught me by example to arrive early and stay late (Hint: That's what good teachers were doing long before TFA). Thank you Mr. Tolliver.

...who well past 60 could still jump desks and bust misbehaving 6th graders.  Thank you Mrs. Tregear.

...who after teaching for 40 years, became the go-to edtech guru for her rural high school. Thank you Mrs. Harris.

...who is part of a group of teachers that designed and runs their own public school based on the Five Core Propositions of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.  Thank you Lori Nazareno.

...who has dedicated over 38 years to working with students of poverty.  Thank you Jon Hanbury.

...of teachers who has transformed how we teach writing by reminding us to keep students at the center. Thank you Dixie Goswami.

...who always brings the edreform discussion back to what does this mean for the students. Thank you Susan Graham.

...who keeps helping other teachers [like me] grow in our thinking and use of digital tools with students. Thank you Bill Ferriter.

...who is absolutely fearless about speaking truth to power in defense of students and teachers. Thank you Anthony Cody.

...who pioneered teaching paperless English classes in the 80s and has consistently issues of power and equity in education.  Thank you Ted Nellen.

...who not only does an amazing job working with students who are ELL, but has also authored three important books, is a 24/7 educational resources curator (and the fastest retweeter I know). Thank you Larry Ferlazzo.

...who excels at asking the most challenging questions and pointing out the many glaring contradictions in U.S. education policy. Thank you Nancy Flanagan.

...several dozen, actually, who are former students of mine and now teachers themselves bringing me hope for our profession. Thank you Angela Towers, Ronda Rimmer, Archie Mitchell, Pamela Jones.......

To all the teachers I know personally and know about who every day, year-after-year, do so much, for so many, with so little....

                                                Thank you.

More #IKnowaTeacher celebrations can be found at:

  The Future of Teaching Blog

  IKnowaTeacher Facebook Page

(Thanks to John Holland for this great campaign to change the public narrative about teachers).

Like educators in nations whose educational systems outperform ours, U.S. teachers should be evaluated on our ability to teach and test what really matters.

The more I think about the current rush to set up quick-and-dirty teacher evaluation systems based primarily on results of misused standardized testing data, the more I realize that we are losing sight of the real prize: our children's learning of important things, and developing the professional expertise of our nation's teachers. That expertise includes being able to teach well and to measure student learning accurately.

During the season of testing-induced madness around the country, I'm reflecting on something I wrote a while back that was also quoted in our new book, Teaching 2030.

For years, one of my favorite classroom assessments has been to tie my opening activity fo the semester to my final exam (a composition). Students start the class by telling me (in writing) about their past experiences with writing, types of writing they have done (in and out of school), and their views on what constitutes good writing. For the final exam, I ask them to revisit that piece and explain what has changed as a result of their experiences in this class. They have to document examples of their own growth as writers. Thus, I have an exit essay that can be graded using the rubric adopted by the English faculty, but I also give the students a tool that guides them through a reflection of what they have learned and why. Student work samples like these (which can be digitized, stored, and analyzed over time) are also extremely valuable to me as evaluations of my own work and of how the class could be improved or changed.

The purpose of my classroom writing assessment is so students and I can measure the amoung of individual progress made by each writer. They all start from different points and end with various levels of proficiency as writers. I can generate reports, based on our school-adopted rubrics and learning outcomes, that show where each student is in relation to those outcomes and how far each student has moved over the course of the semester.

If the scoring instruments that I'm using within my classroom are of high quality, then I as an ethical professionally trained expert should be able to use those instruments to evaluate my students' work accurately and fairly. [Hint to policymakers and pundits: This is what 'good' teachers do]. Why is that too big a leap for our society to make in thinking about what makes an effective classroom teacher? We make exactly the same assumption for doctors, professional sport referrees, and auto mechanics. Do some of them make mistakes in their judgments? Yes. Are some of them unscrupulous or inept. Yes. Do we question the entire enterprise because it includes imperfect assessmsents or some poor performers? No.

We're asking the right policy question when we ask: "How can we better prepare the nation's teachers to conduct, evaluate, and use classroom assessments (formative and summative)---and to share that information in a format usable by parents, schools, employers, and other interested parties. This is the broad vision of accountability that we need.

Ken Bernstein, better known to some as TeacherKen, has posted a fabulous piece at Huffington Post on teacher evaluation that echoes my own feelings on the subject.

Kenneth Bernstein: How Would Teachers Like to be Evaluated? What do They Think is Fair?.

Fair evaluation would include observations by administrators and peers, with feedback that can help me improve as a teacher. It would also include input from parents as they watch their children develop during their time with me. Ideally, it would include having students build and maintain a portfolio of work over the entire year, with periodic reflection on what they are learning, and what it means to them.

 What really stops weak teachers from getting either the help they need or getting removed is not tenure or teacher union contracts (we have neither here where I work). It's sloppy or abused evaluations. I have taught under four different principals. One of them has never actually seen me teach. One saw a grand total of 30 minutes over a two year period. One never looked at any lesson plan I wrote, or ever had a real discussion with me about what I was doing in the classroom. They had excuses--overworked, too much paperwork, too many different responsibilities. "Well, your students are doing okay, so you must be doing something right." 

The lack of real feedback on the quality of my work was my primary motivation for pursuing National Board Certification. My students had "good" test scores, but I could have been a lousy teacher, even treating them inhumanely. As a parent, when my own children, including two with special needs, went through public school, I rarely--if ever--was concerned with the test scores their teachers posted the year or years before. I had more significant concerns: Do you care about my child? Will you take the time to get to know him/her? Will you treat my child as if she were your child? Are you patient? Are you fair? Do you know your subject area well enough and are you secure enough to provide classroom experiences that challenge him to reach his full potential? Can you start with her where she is and help her move forward at a pace that is not too frustrating?

Similarly, an very competent, caring teacher can have weak numbers due to factors beyond his/her control. A truly effective evaluation system would also identify those teachers, and possibly help us as a society do more to support them and their students.  Real evaluation takes time, effort, and mutual respect.

The evaluation system Ken outlines in his post allows teachers to get valuable feedback from all the key stakeholders on the various aspects of our professional practice. How would you feel if this were the standard approach to evaluating public school teachers in the U.S.?  What would it take to get there from where teacher evaluation is now in most places?

I've got an interesting speech to give this week.  I'm talking about what exactly teacher leadership means to a group of teachers in my district who just earned certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. 

In it, I begin a list of things that I would consider to be examples of "teacher leadership."  My goal is to provide concrete definitions of teacher leadership for teachers and principals to refer to. Read through my speech and see if you can add some more specific roles that teacher leaders fill in the comment section:

First, whenever I speak to a group of teachers like this, I like to be completely sure that I'm actually speaking to National Board Certified teachers.  Call it my own little "letter of verification."  So I'm going to share a collection of statements with you, and I want you to raise your hands each time you hear one that resonates with you.

Let's start simply:  Raise your hand if you thought the little blue box that landed on your doorstep last fall looked pretty harmless when it first arrived.  Now raise your hand if your mind changed round about December when your spouse and children were distant memories and your computer had replaced your best friends.

Yup.  National Board Certified Teachers.

Now raise your hand if the term 'assessment center' still gives you nightmares.  Me too!  Raise your hand if you ever cursed the margin and font size rules of the Board, just knowing that if you had a little more space you would be SURE to certify.  Raise your hand if you ever panicked after sealing one of your entries in those seemingly indestructible plastic baggies because you weren't sure that you put the right entry in the bag.

Those guys are National Board Certified!

Now for the real test, though.  Raise your hand if you drew a few strange looks when you stumbled completely exhausted into the post office last spring clutching your little blue box and willing to pay $10,000 to guarantee on time delivery to San Antonio?  And raise your hand if you nearly wore out the mouse button on your computer in November hitting the refresh button trying to get your results to load.

Definitely National Board Certified teachers!

Let me start by offering my sincere congratulations on a job well done!  As a fellow National Board Certified teacher, I know only too well exactly how much sacrifice and commitment that you had to invest to get to this point in your profession.  The countless hours of reading, writing, revising and reflecting culminate here where you get the public praise that you so clearly deserve.

And you definitely deserve it, don't you!  After all, you were willing to take a risk that few others are willing to take.  The chances are good that before you even attempted to certify that you felt pretty good about what you were doing in your classroom.  But you weren't satisfied with good feelings.  You chose to make what you do transparent and to set it open for critique.  Imagine how you would have felt had you not certified.  That's a fear that keeps hundreds of teachers from diving in the National Board waters.

The good news is that along with great risk comes great reward.  I mean, think about this:  You no longer have to wonder whether or not what you're doing in the classroom is right for kids.  Your practice has stood up against the most rigorous standards of excellence in our profession and been deemed accomplished.  What a good feeling, huh?

I think you'd all agree with me, though, that along with great reward comes great responsibility.  Our county, state and nation have set some pretty ambitious goals for public education.  You can see that ambition in the language that surrounds our profession.  We're charged with "Leaving No Child Behind," and "Ensuring Student Success."  "Failure's Not an Option" for us because failure means that students struggle---and that's something we cannot be okay with.

Sometimes this language just plain scares me.  It's intimidating to think of how much is expected of me as a classroom teacher.  I often have to remind myself that these challenges are really opportunities to be embraced.  The only hitch is that in order for us to succeed, each of you needs to be willing to step forward and lead.

That's a catchy little phrase, isn't it? 

Ever since I certified back in 1997, people have been telling me that I'm a teacher leader.  The funny part is that no one ever bothered to explain to me exactly what being a teacher leader meant!  So I've spent the better part of the past 12 years stumbling through the professional dark trying to figure it all out, and luckily for you, I've got a definition to share with you today:

Teacher leaders are practicing educators who are committed to driving change.

Nice, huh?  The only hitch is that the first group of teachers that I presented my definition to hated it!  "That doesn't help us at all, Bill," they said.  "What we really need is for someone to tell us exactly what teacher leaders do.  What does teacher leadership look like in action?"

So I decided to put together a list:

For me, teacher leadership started by simply engaging my colleagues in meaningful conversations about teaching and learning.  I figured that it was impossible to drive change unless we had some real transparency around what it was that we were doing with students. 

Teacher leadership probably also means supporting new colleagues, don't you think?  No matter how good university education programs are, nothing can really prepare you for this gig!  Driving change means lending a hand to the teachers on our hallway who need us the most. 

And I reckon that driving change requires a deep and meaningful understanding of current practices, too.  Teacher leaders, then, are constantly researching and reading about effective instruction.  They've got an almost unsettling fear of stagnation!

Driving change also requires a willingness to raise your voice a bit.  Teacher leaders are always willing to speak up in faculty and team meetings to lend guidance or expertise.  They're presenting at conferences and finding new ways to use digital tools like blogs and wikis to share ideas and resources with the world.  

But most importantly, driving change means having a steadfast belief that reform rests in our hands.  Teacher leaders don't stand around patiently waiting for others to take action.  Instead, they're always acting.  They don't see National Board Certification as an ending.  Instead, they see it as a new beginning--as an invitation to become a forerunner in our profession.

I can honestly say that I'm jazzed to welcome you as my Board Certified colleagues because I'm confident that there isn't anything that we can't do as long as we're willing to walk forward together.

And what an incredible journey that could be!

(Image credit:  365 Day 29 by Shiznotty, licensed Creative Commons: Attribution)