Highly Qualified Teachers for All

Abstract

Fifteen-year-old Jenny Aguerra is an 8th grade student in central Los Angeles. Although she works hard, Jenny has a reading disability and struggles in most subjects that require processing of text. Like Jenny, almost all of the students in her school qualify for free or reduced lunch, and 55 percent are English language learners. Since 2002, when the school was labeled as “in need of improvement” under the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), the teacher turnover rate has hovered around 30 percent a year. In 3rd grade, Jenny had a good year. Her teacher, a four-year veteran who graduated from UCLA's urban teacher education program, understood how to teach English language learners anduse research-based strategies to help Jenny manage her learning disability. Since then, however, Jenny has had novice teachers each year, many of them on emergency teaching permits with no training in teaching reading, working with English language learners, or supporting students with disabilities. Her English teacher this year just entered an alternative certification program and hashad only a few weeks of training. He is grateful that Jenny is quiet and well-behaved in class. He has interacted with her only to express concern about her low marks and urge her to try harder. Jenny increasingly dislikes school, and her grades have slipped this year. She tells her friends that she is thinking of dropping out. Her parents are worried about her but have little time or skill to help. Neither of them finished high school. Both work long hours at multiple jobs, but they still cannot make ends meet. Jenny feels pressure to earn money to help her parents and three younger sisters. Will Jenny stay in school and become successful? Sadly, we can predict the likely answer without consulting tea leaves. A sizable body of research tells us that Jenny will probably not succeed unless the schools she attends provide her with skillful teachers who know both their content and how to teach it to students like Jenny (Darling-Hammond, 2000; Wenglinsky, 2000). Studies show that well-prepared and well-supported teachers are important for all students, but especially for students who come to school with greater needs. That is why one of the most important aspects of NCLB is its demand that states ensure a “highly qualified” teacher for every student. By this school year, teachers of core academic subjects are expected to have a bachelor's degree, full state certification, and proven competency in the subject areas they teach. This first-of-a-kind federal intervention is intended to correct one of the most egregious injustices in the U.S. public school system: Poor students and those of color are November 2006 ASCD