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Friday, April 16, 2010

Letter to School Board about Talent Transfer Initiative | Reflections on Teaching

Reflections on Teaching




Letter to School Board about Talent Transfer Initiative | Reflections on Teaching

Letter to School Board about Talent Transfer Initiative

I arrived at my school Monday to a site abuzz. Coworkers had heard from teachers at other school sites in the district sharing that on Friday, they had received an email that was going out to “a select group of teachers” in our district, offering them the chance to work in high needs schools. Recipients were directed to a site for theTalent Transfer Initiative, a project from the Department of Education ARRA (stimulus) funding. More information about the background of the program can be found on the site for Mathematica, who will be evaluating this project. Although “priority schools” are not mentioned in the email, it’s pretty clear that in the district, my school in particular (being identified by the state as bottom performing) and the other five priority schools are the “target” school or schools for the program.
Only the district administration knows who these emails went out to, but based on conversations about this, some of the teachers are currently teaching at Title One schools. I hope this means that the district is not just looking at “high scoring” teachers, but for teachers who have been successful in schools with similar