T|r"*"'B HBT" ^ r ^ ^ VOL.33, NO. 7-OCTOBER 9,2013

EDUCATION WEEKAMERICAN EDUCATION'S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD • © 2013 Editorial Projects iti Education • $4 O edweek.org: BREAKING NEWS DAILY

Duncan's Clout May Be Sorely Tested as Incentives DwindlePersuasion andsanctions, not

cash promises,loom iarger onpoiicy horizon

By Michèle McNeil

U.S. Secretary of Education Ame Duncan faces anincreasingly rocky education policy landscape and wa-vering support for his aggressive K-12 agenda—at atime when his stack of bargaining chips is dwindling.

Compared to his assets in President BarackObama's first term, Mr. Duncan has few sweeten-ers left to use as leverage. That's likely to leave himeven more dependent on sanctions and persuasion

in the administration's final three years.On the incentive side, he's spent nearly $100 billion

in economic-stimulus money approved by Congress in2009 and used his own authority to hand out No ChildLeft Behind Act waivers to nearly every state.

But Congress seems more dysfunctional than ever,and less and less likely to give the Obama administra-tion what it wants. After the 2014 midterm elections,when the administration will enter its twilight, Mr.Duncan's clout will diminish even more.

Yet this is a crucial time for education policy. Moststates are on the verge of fully implementing theCommon Core State Standards and are bracing forthe tests aligned with them. New teacher evaluationstied to student academic growth are being rolled outacross the country. And the No Child Left Behindwaivers granted to states so far let them set up schoolrating systems approved by the U.S. Department ofEducation with student-achievement goals and inter-

PAGE 22>

Shelby County schools Superintendent Dorsey Hopson II reads a children's book to preschoolers at the LowranceElementary School in Memphis, Tenn. Mr. Hopson says all of tbe district's schools can benefit from more autonomy.

Spotlight Turns on Memphis' RemakeArray of Strategies Aims to Transform Tennessee's Largest District

By Jaclyn ZubrzyckiMemphis,Temi.

With a growing charter school sector, a new state-run district with plans to expand, and a reconfig-ured central office, Memphis is poised to become thenext national center for New Orleems-style schoolgovernance.

Even as a commission spent the past two yearsplanning for the largest school district merger inthe nation's history—the former Memphis city dis-trict and an adjacent suburban system became theunified 140,000-student, 222-school Shelby Countydistrict on July 1—the landscape of governancewithin the legacy city school system was changingrapidly to favor parental choice and more autono-mous schools.

The changes underway here include:• A rapidly expanding array of charter schools.

Home to just three charter schools 10 years ago,Memphis now has 41 charters, and more are on theway, including schools that will be part of some ofthe nation's best-known charter networks.

• A growing Achievement School District. The na-tion's second state-run school district, Tennessee'sAchievement School District oversees 12 schoolsin the city and plans to run more than 50, most ofthem within Memphis, over the next five years.

• An "Innovation Zone." Created by the district EISthe analogue to the state-run district, the Innova-tion Zone, or I-Zone, encompasses 13 schools thathave budget and hiring autonomy.

As a model for the Memphis efforts, district,charter, and state leaders are looking down theMississippi River to New Orleans, where thestate-run Recovery School District has convertedmost of the public schools in the city to charterstatus. The goal is to create a "system of schoolsrather than a school system," said Bradley Leon,the new chief innovation officer for the ShelbyCounty district.

"Our belief is that Memphis is poised to be eitherthe first or among the first major urban centersto fully and deeply transform public education forall kids—in our case, without having had to suf-

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Online Teacher Prep Proliferates,But For-Proflts Dominate Market

By Stephen SawchukLos Angeles

One by one, the faces pop up onthe computer screen. Some of theaspiring teachers hold coffee cups;others have their hair in ponytailsor pushed into caps.

It's 6 a.m., California time. Sev-eral of the virtual attendees are ona less punishing East Coast sched-ule. One is tuning in from Taiwan,where it's already nightfall. Butnobody's in PJs, because this isa classroom and there are rulesabout comportment.

The teacher-candidates are tak-ing part in the online Master ofArts in Teaching program offeredby the University of Southern Cali-

•TEACHINGO THE TEACHERS

An occasional series

fomia's Rossier School of Educa-tion. Over a span of months, theywill learn how to teach in urbanschools without meeting one an-other—or their professors—in per-son until graduation.

Online teacher education isprobably the fastest-growing sec-tor of teacher preparation. For-profit online institutions are nowbeing joined by brick-and-mortaruniversities like use here, andstartups, both pubHc and private.

"The big concern is how you buüdPAGE 16>

DIGITAL DIRECTIONS

N.Y.C. Tech Glitches Prompt Big PayoutBy Benjamin Herold

A $41 milUon-and-counting set-tlement being paid to educatorsin New York City public schoolscould have big implications forschool districts across the countrystruggling to provide adequatetechnology and Internet band-width for their employees.

In April, the New York City de-partment of education began pay-ing back wages to more than 30,000teachers, school psychologists, so-

cial workers, and others after anarbitrator agreed with the UnitedFederation of Teachers that manyof its members had been improperlyforced to work beyond their contrac-tually mandated workday whenimplementation of a new student-information system was plaigued byslow Internet connections, glitchysoftware, a lack of computers, andpoor training and technical assis-tance. Initially, the legal decisionwent largely unnoticed outside of

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Fiscal StormSchools and districtsweathered the firstdays of the federalgovernment's shutdownwithout majordisruption, althoughsome educators areanxious about thelong-term implicationsof Washington's budgetstalemate, PAGE 20

• TEACHING

Online Teacher PreparationBuilds Steam Across NationCONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

relationships with students, how do you connectwith students?" said Corinne E. Hyde, an assis-tant professor of clinical education in the MAT.program at the Rossier school, where the onlineprogram was launched in 2009.

"It would seem to he very impersonal, butthe [virtual interaction]... makes it really pos-sihle to huild those connections," she said. "Of-tentimes, I feel like I know my students a lothetter, because I'm seeing into their homes."

Meredith Curley, the dean of the Universityof Phoenix, sees greater acceptance of an on-line route to earning a teaching credential.

"Having more providers in the marketreally speaks to the fact that there is a de-mand," said Ms. Curley, whose for-profit uni-versity is the nation's largest producer of edu-cation degrees.

A Booming FieldOnline teacher preparation has typically

served practicing teachers seeking recerti-fication or master's degrees to help themmove up the salary scale. Only since theearly 2000s has initial preparation onlinebegun to make a mark.

The provider marketplace remains domi-nated by for-profit institutions—some op-erating wholly online—but the competitionhas been impossible for brick-and-mortarinstitutions to ignore. Of the 674 institutionsresponding to queries about online teacherpreparation in a data-collection effort con-ducted hy the American Association of Collegesfor Teacher Education, or AACTE, 36 offered atleast one wholly online imdergraduate educa-tion program as of the 2009-10 academic year,and 140 offered at least one online-only mas-ter's program for initial certification.

A whopping 74 percent of the institutionssurveyed offered some courses online.

Among the reasons for the high level of in-terest is a desire to tap career changers andother individuals whose circumstances limittheir ability to spend hours on campus.

That's the case with the University of the

Pacific, which has signed a partnership withTeach-Now, a new online teacher-certificationstartup, to offer a master's degree and initial-certification program.

"Most candidates cannot, with their family£ind adult responsibilities, take several yearsto pursue a teaching credential. We had tomake it intensive and meet them where theyare," said Michael Elium, the assistant dean ofthe Stockton, Caüf.-based imiversit/s educa-tion school. "They need intense, high-quality,and affordable" preparation.

The expense of online teacher-preparationprograms varies widely. Teach-Now's certifi-cation costs begin at $6,000, while the Uni-versity of Phoenix's tuition and fees rangefrom $15,000 to $30,000 for a master's de-gree in elementary education. Use chargestuition identical to that for candidates in on-campus classes, which works out to about$49,000 for the M.A.T program.

Much online preparation continues to takeplace in an "asynchronous" format, a techni-cal term meaning that learning takes placewith candidates working in their own time,typically by participating through virtualmessage hoards and completing written as-signments and quizzes online.

Flexible HoursThere are obvious benefits to such fiexible

hours, especially for working professionals. Atthe same time, faculty members can quicklygauge candidates' participation, said Ms. Curleyof the University of Phoenix.

"At this point, the asynchronous [interac-tion] seems to be a plus for us, and utiUza-tion of onhne platforms to share tools andresources is the focus of our innovation,"she said. For insteince, the university ismilking toolkits with resources on theCommon Core State Standards avail-able to candidates and faculty on itsonline portal.

Increasingly, though, the providers'delivery formats are evolving as well.Use has chosen a different path, devisinga novel way to deliver online preparation in

real time. Teacher-candidates on a Weh plat-form, which is managed by 2U, a Landover,Md.-hased technology firm, can all see oneanother. A conference-call line keeps every-one connected. The platform allows studentsto message each other, contribute to oral orwritten discussions, and raise their hands—electronically speaking—to seek help.

Eric Bernstein, an assistant professor of clini-cal education, can separate students quicklyinto smaller groups for breakout discussionsand then bring them back together with a mini-mum of lost time—something that wouldn't bepossible ia a large lecture hall.

That's only the beginning, though: There's"block party," where small groups of studentsare rotated quickly, and silent discussion,where students respond to readings and dis-

AWARDING DEGREESMost of the top 10 providers of educationdegrees offer at least one degree onlineleading to initial teacher certification.

2011-12 Education Degree Production

institution

University of Phoenix (oniine campus)

Grand Canyon University

Ashford University

Waiden University

Western Governors University

Arizona State University

Lamar University

National University

Nova Southeastern University

Arkansas State University-Main Campus

State

AZAZIAMNUTAZTXCAFLAR

TotalDegrees'

7,533

4,573

3,047

2,502

2,171

1,978

1,809

1,770

1,735

1,698

Bachelor'sdegree

711539

1,380

141,006

1,005

76100309

Master'sdegree

3,887

4,023

1,474

2,285

1,165

8661,790

1,694

1,302

1,378

Type ofinstitution

For-profit

For-profit

For-profit

For-profit

Nonprofit

Public

Public

Nonprofit

Nonprofit

Public

' Total degrees include associate and doctoral degrees. Some master's degrees do not contain a certification component.

' Does not offer an online teacher-preparation program.

SOURCE: National Center for Education Statistics

Ed. Researcher Moves Into Certification BusinessFor decades, C. Emily Feistritzer has heen one of the

nation's foremost analysts of alternative certification pro-grams for training teachers. Now she's taken what might becalled the final plunge: crafting one of her own.

"Having spent 30 years reporting on what everyone wasdoing in the teacher-preparation and -certification space, Ijust concluded that nobody was really focusing on tomor-row's learning world," Ms. Feistritzer said. "There is toomuch controversy, too much lack of continuity, too muchduphcation of effort. If you could step outside of it and cre-ate an ideal program, what would it look like?"

Her answer, Teach-Now, recently opened its doors as afully online teacher-certification program. It is currentlyapproved in the District of Colimibia, with negotiations on-going to bring it to states around the country.

Funded partially through a $250,000 grant from the NewSchools Venture Fund, an Oakland, Cauf.-based group thatinvests in emerging innovations, from technologies to charter-management organizations, Teach-Now dispenses with tradi-

tional unit-based courses. Instead, candidates complete eightunits ranging from assessment to student learning in a digitalera, plus engage in ongoing fieldwork and student teaching.

Using e-PortfoliosThe fuUy interactive, custom-biult platform is based on

two principles in the teacher education literature, Ms. Feis-tritzer said: Teachers in training benefit from working witheach other, and they benefit from lots of hands-on practice.So the platform uses the "fiip" model popularized by theKhan Academy, an online educat ion resource, in whichreadings and new techniques are introduced at home, whueclass t ime is spent practicing and honing them.

An "e-portfolio" tracks each Teach-Now candidate's scoreson the activities tha t make up each of eight units of studyto give candidates real- t ime feedback. Instructors mus thave taught for a t least three years and received leader-ship roles or recognition for their work. Each supervises a

cohort of no more than 12 candidates.Ms. Feistritzer has at t racted well-known figures in the

teacher-preparat ion world to t he init iat ive. Among he rhires is Donna GoUnick, a 25-year ve teran of one of thenational accreditation bodies for education colleges.

"I think the better online programs are really using thetechnology more effectively," Ms. Gollnick said. "Studentsdo a lot of the work they would have formerly done in theclassroom on their own, and the class becomes more of acoaching method of helping them understand what they'veread, seen in a video, or observed in a school."

Ms. Gollnick will help smooth state approval of the pro-gram and partnerships with universities interested in in-tegrating it. Already, the Stockton, Calif-based Universityof the Pacific has inked a deal to use Teach-Now as par t ofa new master's degree program aimed a t career-changers.

The program is not intended to be a competitor for otheralternative routes, according to Ms. Feistritzer.

"I created it to be used hy providers in the teacher educa-tion space," she said.

Teach-Now's inaugura l class began in March and willcomplete the program in December. -STCPHEN SAWCHUK

The TEACHER BEAT blog tracks news and trends on this issue. O www.edvveek.org/go/teachert)eat

16 i EDUCyVTION WEEK I October 9, 2013 I www.edweel<.org

Bank Street Aims to Retain 'Essence' in Virtual ProgramIt's one of the ongoing challenges of preparing teachers and

administrators online: Can on-the-job practice that is super-vised remotely be effective—especially when it's the heart andsoul of a program?

This fall, the Bank Street College of Education, a small, pri-vate New York City-based institution best known for hands-onapproaches to preparing teachers and leaders, will begin toseek its own answers. It's beginning a study to examine howto translate the supervised fieldwork component of its mathleadership program, now offered in person over three sum-mers, into an online setting.

Bank Street's hallmark is its small, tightly knit cohorts of aspir-ing educators who meet periodically, plus the deep involvement ofa faculty adviser. Advisers frequently visit each candidate at hisor her school, interacting with him or her in a specific way.

"How do you create that relational learning onhne?" saidRobin Humtmel, the interim director of the math-leadershipprogram. "We want to attract people from aU over and make theprogram accessible to those who can't come to New York, butwe don't want to lose the essence of what defines Bank Street."

From next January to May, a Bank Street faculty instructorwill work with six New York City public school teacher vol-

xmteers, who will participate in five real-time, online sessionstogether. Participating teachers will also receive two individualcoaching sessions in which they'll receive planning conferencesand debriefs on their teaching from the faculty member.

Enhancing FieldworkMeanwhile, a work group, staffed by experts in both math

pedagogy and learning technology will advise the college andexiimine technologies that could enhance the fieldwork ex-perience. Those might include earpieces that allow a mentorto communicate remotely with each candidate, Ms. Himmielsaid. But the first priority is making sure that the institution's"learner centered" approach is preserved, she said.

The study is being carried out vdth support from a $50,000grant from lOOK in 10, a privately funded network of partnerorganizations that are seeking to train 100,000 effective math,technology, engineering, and science teachers over a decade.

The knowledge gleaned from the study will inform the on-line iteration of the math-leadership program and a seconddegree path, both of which are scheduled to debut in the fallof 2014. -STEPHEN SAWCHUK

cussion prompts in a chat window for allto see.

That variety is one of the main advEincesoffered by online teacher preparation, saidSharon Robinson, the president of AACTE.

"What these students experience in theironline courses is perhaps a stronger senseof community than if they show up in alarge lecture hall and leave as anonymousnumbers on the seating chart," she said.

For this story, an Education Week re-porter attended several ordine sessions intwo use courses, one concerned with thesocial context of urban schools, a second onlearning theories.

New Pedagogical OpportunitiesAlthough the M.A.T. students don't take

their specific teaching-methods coursesuntil later in the program, professors at-tempted to link theoretical discussions tothe real world. The professors often usedvideo excerpts to have candidates applyknowledge fi-om their readings.

In Ms. Hyde's class, for instance, teacher-candidates begiin to practice how to writespecific learning objectives and select as-sessments to match. During small groups,lively discussions arose about the appropri-ate place of standardized testing in shapingteacher behavior.

Uniquely in teacher education, learning ina digital format opens up new pedagogicalopportunities that professors can help can-didates try out in K-12 classrooms, facultymembers said. For instance, Mr. Bernstein,the use professor, sometimes uses the silent-discussion tool rather than conversationsduring the discussion portion of his onlinecourse. The goal is to draw out shy candi-dates, while also challenging those whoaren't as confident in their vmting.

And that basic technique, he remindscandidates, can also be used even in class-rooms without technology: Put up somequestions on the blackboard and have stu-dents answer them on sticky notes.

"We're going to mix it up," Mr. Bernsteintold the aspiring teachers. "And what youwant to do in your classroom is mix it upand provide different types of opportunitiesfor students to engage."

The student-teaching or "clinical" part ofpreparation is one element of teacher edu-cation that presents a quandary for onlineteacher preparation.

At use, the responsibility for ensuringhigh-quality student-teaching rests with

2U. It has built a massive network of part-ners covering some 1,800 school districts,where candidates are placed for student-teaching.

Here again, technology provides thelink: The aspiring teachers use cameras todocument their experiences in the class-room and send them back for critiques byprofessors in the program. (Ironing outprivacy issues with the schools in whichcandidates practice is 2U's responsibility.)

"We covered all the traditional [theorists],but the part I thought was most practical wasthat the majority of assigimients had to bedelivered on site," said Connor E. Nesseler, arecent graduate of the program who is nowteaching 7th grade sodal studies amd human-ities in San Diego.

"I had to first develop a lesson, introduceit [at school], and deliver it, and come backand reflect on it," he said. "Professors wouldtell us to create it, experience it, and thenwe'd move from there [to] how to improve."

His one concern? Sometimes it was hardto come up with times for classmates tomeet online during nonclass hours.

Staffing ModelsIn the field at large, the rapid expansion

of online programs has led to even moredifferentiation in staffing models. In somecases, as with the University of Phoenixand Teach-Now, the programs rely moreheavuy on instructors with practical expe-rience than top academic credentials.

Use has hired some 165 adjuncts tohelp meet demand, although full-timeonline professors, such as Mr. Bernsteinand Ms. Hyde, don't sense a fracturing inthe faculty. Instead, they say, the platformhas improved efforts to work in concert torevise and improve the classes, both forthose teaching on campus and online.

That's a good thing, said Karen SymmsGallagher, the dean of the Rossier Schoolof Education.

"If you say you have a common course,you have to make sure every professoris following it," Ms. Gallagher said. "It iseasier to know that online. And studentswül tell you."

About 1,700 individuals have gradu-ated from the program since its inception.Those figures help put use among the 30top producers of education degrees, butstill far below the largest for-profit pro-grams.

Data on the performance of students taught

by teachers trained online are somewhatharder to come by. Caüfomia, for instance,does not link teacher and student recordsdirectly; students and graduates from use'sMaster of Arts in Teaching program now rep-resent 47 states and 38 foreign countries.

Dean Gallagher summed up the chal-lenge: "We can't just say, '80 percent of theteachers who gave us data look good.' "

Broadly speaking, the expansion of onlineteacher preparation has prompted somesoul-searching among teacher-educators.The pedagogical benefits among the variousonline formats aren't clear and have yet tobe extensively canvassed in research.

"I'm amazed that we don't see anybodydoing data-based research. They're doingqualitative stuff, and that doesn't tell usmuch," said Paul Beare, the dean of theeducation school at California State Uni-versity, Fresno. "If I hadn't seen what Cal-StateTEAeH had done, I'd have had a biasagainst [online preparation]."

CalStateTEAeH is an online preparationprogram offered through four of the pubhcuniversity system's campuses. Mr. Beare'sresearch indicates that students surveyedgave higher marks to the online programthan they did to esu's campus-basedprograms.

It also remains an open question howmuch online teacher preparation differsin content from what's offered in face-to-face settings. The use courses, for instance,focused on how to be a reflective practi-tioner. Later this semester, participantswül encounter articles critiquing stEindard-ized testing and the federal No Child LeftBehind Act. Coursework covers behavioraltheory and cognitive development, all by nowestablished themes in teacher preparation.

For his part, Mr. Bernstein takes pridein the fact that he's able to engage his stu-dents online as much, if not more, than ifthey were in a physical classroom. He fliesfrom Connecticut to California to attendannual graduation ceremonies in personfor the teacher-candidates he's taught.

"The biggest shock is our heights," Mr.Bernstein said about meeting the teacher-candidates he's taught in the flesh for thefirst time. "You can't judge that on thecomputer screen."

Coverage of policy efforts to improve the teachingprofession is supported by a grant from the JoyceFoundation, at wiuw.jciycxfdn.org I Programs IEducation. Education Week retains sole editorialcontrol over the content of this coverage.

use Brings Its BrandTo Online OfferingFor Teacher Prep.

Los Angeles

Of new entrants to the online teacher-preparation market, among the most visibleis the University of Southem California'sRossier School of Education. Since 2009,more than 3,600 prospective teachers haveenrolled.

To an extent, its success is the product of aseries of fortuitous events. One was the ar-rival, in 2000, of Rossier Dean Karen SymmsGallagher, who wanted to move use's small,somewhat marginalized undergraduateteacher education program to the graduatelevel and expand it. Use's stated missionfor teacher preparation is to improve urbaneducation nationally and globally, and at just50 teachers a year, "we were clearly not evenmeeting local needs," Ms. Gallagher said.

Then, she was introduced to John Katzman,the founder of a technology company thatcame to be known as 2U. He pressed her toconsider an online iteration of the newlyformed Masters of Arts in Teaching degree.

Ultimately, a partnership emerged: Mr.Katzman agreed to invest in the building ofa customized, online platform for Rossier andto endow a faculty position, while Rossierwould continue to select high-quality candi-dates. Faculty advising the project insisted ona platform that would be fully interactive andthat could record online interactions for futureresearch.

Enrollments Rising SteadilyThe ambitious endeavor was nevertheless

a gamble for a research institution."What we really brought to the partner-

ship was our brand, and use's behind it,"Ms. Gallagher said. "We are investing ourreputation."

Enrollments have risen steadily. In fact,they have helped to shield Rossier from thesteep decline in enrollments in teaching pro-grams in California. The online MAT has alsoaffected other traditional structures: Full-time faculty who teach in the MAT programand aren't located in Southern Californiawork under contracts based almost entirelyon their teaching duties.

It also has injected transparency intowhether what's taught lines up with theprogram's goals. "Everyone can share witheach other how they're helping studentsleeim," said Melora Sundt, the vice dean ofacademic programs at Rossier. "MAT facultyare much more comfortable with the reviewof their own instruction and feedback."

The changes here have not always beencomfortable for all. Some view the program'srapid expansion as overly corporate.

"People will say, 'It's about the money.' I al-ways say, well, it better be—^we're a privateinstitution,'" Ms. Sundt said. "It is about ourmission, but it feels )fucky to some facultymembers that you also have to consider thefinancial model for the program."

On the other hand, participating faculty sayteaching online has led them to experiment.

"Oftentimes as professors it's hard to re-linquish control, and this format forces youto," said Corinne E. Hyde, an assistant pro-fessor of clinical education. "If you get up infront of these students and lecture them,they're going to be on Facebook in 15 min-utes. You're forced to really be on your toes,grab their attention, and hold it."

-STEPHEN SAWCHUK

EDUCATION WEEK i October 9, 2013 i www.edweek.org I 17

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