‘We Need Teacher Leaders’: Joint Initiative Launched to Elevate Education Profession
By Tim Walker and Celeste Busser
NEA President Dennis Van Roekel remembers how incredulous he was when he sat in the audience at NBC’s first Education Nation in 2011 to listen to a panel of non-teachers talking about teachers. Even though it was merely a television broadcast, the event was symptomatic of the absence of teacher voices in the national dialogue about public education.Which is why NEA has taken the lead through a series of initiatives that aim to empower teachers to lead, shape education policy, and prepare the next generation of teacher leaders.
On Tuesday, at NEA headquarters in Washington D.C.,Van Roekel, joined by Ron Thorpe of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) and Barnett Berry of the Center for Teaching Quality (CTQ), announced the national Teacher Leadership Initiative (TLI), a joint endeavor between the three organizations to advance the profession through teacher leadership.
“This is truly the beginning of something great,” Van Roekel said. “This initiative will ultimately develop expertise and engage thousands of teacher-leaders in leadership work in schools, with NEA affiliates, and in state houses throughout the country—because every student should have the best possible educators in their schools.”
“It is our strong belief that positive change in education must be driven by the profession and shaped by the invaluable experience of teachers working in classrooms. The TLI initiative marks an important milestone in our collective effort to elevate the profession,” added Thorpe.
The long-term goals of the TLI are: 1) design accomplished-level-teacher standards; 2) develop relevant experiences and supports to help teachers meet those standards; and (3) activate teachers to be leaders for their profession as a result of their participation in this process.
One hundred and fifty educators representing Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan and Mississippi have been chosen for the 2014 pilot year. Participants in the pilot will engage with an interact