MSP News: Teachers' Perceptions
March 18, 2010
NEWS IN BRIEF
1. UPCOMING MSP WORKSHOP
Boston Science Partnership Showcase 2010: A New Vision of Urban Science Education
April 12th & 13th, 2010 in Boston, MA
You are invited to attend the Boston Science Partnership's Showcase and MSP Working Session. This special two-day event will highlight BSP's achievements in its primary five years of NSF MSP funding.
2. NEW IN LIBRARY
A. "Primary Sources: America's Teachers on America's Schools," Scholastic and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, March 2010.
B. "Teaching for a Living," Learning Point Associates and Public Agenda with the support of the Joyce Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, October 2009.
C. "Convergence and Contradictions in Teachers' Perceptions of Policy and Reform Ideas," Learning Point Associates and Public Agenda with the support of the Joyce Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, February 2010.
D. "A Blueprint for Reform: The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act," US Department of Education, March 2010.
DETAILS BELOW
1. UPCOMING MSP WORKSHOP
Boston Science Partnership Showcase 2010: A New Vision of Urban Science Education
April 12th & 13th, 2010 in Boston, MA
You are invited to attend the Boston Science Partnership's Showcase and MSP Working Session. This special two-day event will highlight evidence of outcomes that the Boston Science Partnership (BSP) has achieved in its primary five years of NSF MSP funding. We invite your Partnerships and your colleagues to join us for either or both of the days as we share results, celebrate successes, and use the BSP as a case study of a successful project.
The framing questions for the conference are: What has the Boston Science Partnership meant to Boston? and What can others learn from the Boston science story?
April 12 - BSP Showcase: The Showcase will be a daylong seminar in which we report on the findings from the project, relate quantitative and qualitative results about science achievement and professional development, and bring a wide variety of Boston science stakeholders together to understand the past and envision the future. Registration for the Showcase can be found on our website (www.bostonscience.org).
April 13 - MSP Working Session: The MSP Working Session will provide an opportunity for those interested in learning from and replicating aspects of the BSP to learn more about how our Partnership has accomplished its goals, and to explore the BSP's strategies and emerging models in more depth. The BSP will serve as a case study of a mature project in Year 6 of its funding. Empirical evidence will be a component of each topic throughout the day. Principal Investigators from other projects will provide additional examples from their contexts to complement the specifics from Boston.
The primary target audiences for the MSP Working Session on April 13th are NSF-funded MSP projects, state MSP projects, and MSP-Start teams in the proposal development stages. There are a limited number of travel stipends for NSF projects only. Please see website for more information.
MSPnet Location: SHOWCASE>>Highlights
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20581
2. NEW IN LIBRARY
A. "Primary Sources: America's Teachers on America's Schools," Scholastic and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, March 2010.
"This Landmark report presents the results of a national survey of more than 40,000 public school teachers in grades pre-K to 12. The survey reveals that, while teachers have high expectations for their students, they overwhelmingly agree that too many students are leaving unprepared for success beyond high school. Primary Sources reveals teachers' thoughtful, nuanced views on issues at the heart of education reform - from performance pay and standardized tests to academic standards and teacher evaluation. Teacher responses reveal five powerful solutions to raise student achievement."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Professional Development
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20586
B. "Teaching for a Living," Learning Point Associates and Public Agenda with the support of the Joyce Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, October 2009.
"This report highlights the views and workplace preference of three distinct types of teachers: the idealists, the contented, and the disheartened--why they entered teaching, the atmosphere and leadership in their schools, the problems they face, their students and student outcomes, and ideas for reform. Taking a closer look at the teaching profession based on the attitudes and motivations for each of these groups can provide state and district leaders valuable insights for how to identify, retain, and support the most effective teachers."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Professional Development
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20585
C. "Convergence and Contradictions in Teachers' Perceptions of Policy and Reform Ideas," Learning Point Associates and Public Agenda with the support of the Joyce Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, February 2010.
"As a new decade dawns, teachers stand at the center of a policy vortex. They serve as the primary focus of one of the Obama administration's four pillars of educational reform--effective teachers and leaders. Educational reformers of all stripes have focused tremendous energy on thinking of ways to identify effective teachers and in turn recruit, retain, compensate, and support them. But what do teachers think of these ideas? What conclusions should reformers draw from teachers' perceptions? This report is the third release of data from the Retaining Teacher Talent study, conducted by Learning Point Associates and Public Agenda with the support of The Joyce Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The report suggests that what teachers think are good indicators of effectiveness--and what they think will make them more effective--are not always aligned with what policymakers or researchers think."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Professional Development
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20584
D. "A Blueprint for Reform: The Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act," US Department of Education, March 2010.
On Saturday, March 13, the Obama administration released its blueprint for revising the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), which would ask states to adopt college- and career-ready standards and reward schools for producing dramatic gains in student achievement. The proposal challenges the nation to embrace educational standards that would put America on a path to global leadership.
The blueprint provides incentives for states to adopt academic standards that prepare students to succeed in college and the workplace and create accountability systems that measure student growth toward meeting the goal that all children graduate and succeed in college.
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Ed Change & Policy
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20583