Mesa was one of the first districts to adopt ASU\u2019s Next Education Workforce program. Rather than a single teacher responsible for a stand-alone classroom of 30 students, NEW teachers work in teams of two to six educators of different subject and specialty expertise\u2014often supported by preservice teachers, career-technical instructors, and tutors\u2014to teach groups of about 100 students. The teams collaborate on lessons, schedules, and flexible student groups each day. <\/p>\n
Teamed teachers were more likely to be early in their careers and less likely to hold master\u2019s degrees than their peers working solo, and they were also more likely to teach in higher-poverty schools\u2014all characteristics generally linked to higher teacher turnover. <\/p>\n
But the researchers found, after controlling for teacher and school characteristics, that the teamed teachers were half as likely to leave their schools as their non-teamed peers. <\/p>\n
Why? Ingersoll and his colleagues surmise that the teachers working in the teams both developed a greater sense of ownership and accountability for their teaching practice than did teachers in stand-alone classes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt turns out a really key element is that teachers be given some leeway to design and shape\u201d education and practice decisions, Ingersoll said. \u201cIf they have more autonomy, more voice, more authority, then it really makes a big, big difference in their retention.\u201d<\/p>\n
Through surveys, the researchers found the New Education Workforce teachers were more likely than teachers in the district working solo to feel they had a say in education decisions at their school. Teamed teachers were also more likely than solo teachers to feel control over their schedules and able to take creative approaches to instruction.<\/p>\n
Teachers, both solo and in teams, who reported a stronger sense of autonomy in their teaching were more likely to remain in their schools. But teamed teachers who reported the strongest sense of authority in their teaching practice had the highest retention of any group\u2014only about 6% of them left the following year, compared to 16% of solo teachers with little sense of teaching authority.<\/p>\n
Empowering teachers to make important decisions<\/h2>\n
Brent Maddin, the executive director of ASU\u2019s Next Education Workforce initiative, said it does take time and training to prepare teachers to work in teams. The group works with schools to determine how to structure teaching teams, and participating teachers get ongoing professional development.<\/p>\n
The 3,300-student Westwood High was among the first in the district to adopt NEW team teaching. Each of its nine teams is responsible for around 150 students in 9th or 10th grade, and includes an English, math, science, social studies, and career-education teacher, as well as a special educator. But Harris, the principal, said teaching teams still take a while to develop healthy roles and group practices.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose first couple of months, it was terrible because we didn\u2019t know what we were doing. They were like, \u2018We\u2019re going to give you some autonomy. You don\u2019t have to stay with the bell schedule,\u2019\u201d Harris recalled, \u201cbut I didn\u2019t know how to do all of the things, because I was coming from compliance, compliance, compliance. … So it took a while to come together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maddin agreed, noting that school and district leaders have an important role to play in team-teaching\u2019s success.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the most effective models that we have, the school leaders are not just saying [to teachers], \u2018Yes, you can do these things,\u2019\u201d Maddin said, \u201cbut also are actively asking, \u2018So, educator team, have you flexed your schedule recently?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The study showed that having clear team support and accountability, coupled with flexibility for teachers within those teams, were associated with the highest teacher retention. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe conventional model pretends that the teacher can do everything for everybody and knows it all. And no one can. It\u2019s ridiculous. And in this [NEW] model, teachers have autonomy, but also they\u2019re within a team so it\u2019s not just like an individual can go run amok. Seven heads are better than one, so to speak,\u201d Ingersoll said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
English teacher Vatricia Harris came to Westwood High School in Mesa, Ariz. eight years ago as an experienced\u2014and disillusioned\u2014educator. \u201cI came here because I was … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":396,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":397,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394\/revisions\/397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mssqlguide.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}