Trusting Teachers with School Success

What Happens When Teachers Call the Shots

Kim Farris-Berg, Edward J. Dirkswager

• Publisher: R&L Education
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9781610485111
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Lately, our nation's strategy for improving our schools is mostly limited to "getting tough" with teachers. Blaming teachers for poor outcomes, we spend almost all of our energy trying to control teachers' behavior and school operations. But what if all of this is exactly the opposite of what is needed? What if teachers are the answer and not the problem? What if trusting teachers, and not controlling them, is the key to school success?
Examining the experiences of teachers who are already trusted to call the shots, this book answers: What would teachers do if they had the autonomy not just to make classroom decisions, but to collectively—with their colleagues—make the decisions influencing whole school success? Decisions such as school curriculum, how to allocate the school budget, and whom to hire.
Teachers with decision-making authority create the schools that many of us profess to want. They individualize learning. Their students are active (not passive) learners who gain academic and life skills. The teachers create school cultures that are the same as those in high-performing organizations. They accept accountability and innovate, and make efficient use of resources. These promising results suggest: it's time to trust teachers.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• What Would Happen If We Trusted Teachers with School Success?
• Introduction: To Get High-Performing Schools, Maybe It’s Time to Trust Teachers
• Teacher Autonomy: What It Is, Who Has It, and How It’s Secured
• When Granted Autonomy, Teachers Choose to Operate in Ways That Emulate the Cultural Characteristics of High-Performing Organizations
• Eight Practices Autonomous Teachers Embrace, Which Are Indicative of the Cultural Characteristics of High-Performing Organizations
• Practice #1: Share Purpose, Which Always Focuses on Students as Individuals, and Use It as the Basis of Decisions Aimed at School Improvement
• Practice #2: Participate in Collaboration and Leadership for the Good of the Whole School, Not Just a Classroom
• Practice #3: Encourage Colleagues and Students to Be Active, Ongoing Learners in an Effort to Nurture Everyone’s Engagement and Motivation
• Practice #4: Develop or Adopt Learning Programs That Individualize Student Learning
• Practice #5: Address Social and Discipline Problems as Part of Student Learning
• Practice #6: Broaden the Definition and Scope of Student Achievement and Assessment
• Practice #7: Encourage Teacher Improvement Using 360-Degree, Peer-, and Self-Evaluation Methods as Well as Peer Coaching and Mentoring
• Practice #8: Make Budget Trade-Offs to Meet the Needs of Students They Serve
• Implementation Strategies for Those Who Want to Support Teacher Autonomy
• It’s Time to Trust Teachers
• Appendix A: Evolution of K–12 Public Schools with Teacher Autonomy A hyperlinked version of appendix A is available on the Education|Evolving website www.educationevolving.org.
• Appendix B: Demographics at the Eleven Schools
• Appendix C: Online Survey Instrument
• Appendix D: Hope Survey Assessment Tool (www.hopesurvey.org)
• Appendix E: Sample Project Evaluation Rubric
• Appendix F: TAGOS Leadership Academy’s Raised Responsibility Rubric
• Bibliography
• About the Authors
• Trusting Teachers Website