Gates and Duncan Seek to Use Trust in Teachers to Promote Common Core
This week, National Board certified teachers gathered in Washington for the National Board's annual Teaching and Learning conference. They were presented with a beguiling vision of teacher leadership, from both Arne Duncan and Bill Gates. It is beguiling because it offers NBCTs an opportunity to grasp something that teachers desperately desire - a sense of authorship over their classrooms, and genuine influence over future education policy.
But what is being offered calls into question the meaning of true leadership.
Here is what Duncan promised in his speech:
That's why Ron [National Board CEO Ron Thorpe] and I are working together on an initiative called Teach to Lead. Our aim is to encourage schools and districts, and hopefully even states, all over the country to provide more opportunities for genuine, authentic teacher leadership that don't require giving up a daily role in the classroom. And because this only works if superintendents and principals see it as part of the solution, they'll be involved from the start.We will convene a group of teachers, principals, state Chiefs, teachers' groups and district leaders, among others. This group will take the steps necessary not to create white papers to decorate shelves -- but to foster real-world commitments on teacher leadership. This group will announce significant commitments from districts, teachers' groups, and others who want to be part of the solution to make teacher leadership real at scale -- using the ample existing body of work on this as a springboard for action. And I want you to hold us accountable at this event, a year from now, for what we've been able to accomplish.
This initiative, unfortunately will not yield much beyond some plum positions, if I might...