Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for January 22, 2007 NATIONAL CERTIFICATION

From the Washington Post...

National Certification Pays Off With Stipend And Stamp of Approval

By Michael Alison Chandler
Washington Post Staff Writer

After a grueling application process that lasted hundreds of hours, Leesburg teacher Diann Morales captured the highest credential in her profession last month. The payoff was visible one recent day in her classroom at Seldens Landing Elementary School:

Two dozen first-graders unscrambled words in a language unit. They spotted contractions in a poem and read aloud to themselves with the help of "whisper phones," or plastic tubes that amplify their voices to help them catch mistakes. Student achievement, Morales said, has soared in reading and writing.

The eight-year veteran credits the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards with giving her a more thoughtful approach. With each exercise, she now asks herself: "Why am I doing this? Because it's cute and parents are going to like it? Because the county wants it done? Or is it because a student learns best this way?"

Morales was one of about 200 public school teachers across the Washington region to win certification in 2006 from the Arlington County-based national board. The public school systems in Loudoun, Calvert and Charles counties and the District had the lowest totals of new board-certified teachers in the area: two each. Montgomery County had the most: 72.

Although some wonder how much the program raises student achievement, there is a growing movement toward national certification. The number of board-certified teachers has tripled in the past five years to more than 55,000 nationwide. Increasingly, school systems are seeking to raise teacher quality.

This notion is built into the federal No Child Left Behind law, which requires states to have "highly qualified" teachers for all core academic classes, meaning they must have a bachelor's degree, a full state credential and demonstrated knowledge of the subjects they teach. But standards for subject knowledge vary widely from state to state.

By contrast, the process for national board certification is uniform across the country. Applications can take up to 400 hours to complete. Applicants must finish in-depth projects, assemble a portfolio that includes video of themselves teaching and take an online test. Fewer than half of applicants earn certification the first year they apply. The process aims to push teachers to adapt lessons for each child, analyze why certain methods work and reach out to colleagues and the families of students.

Prince George's County School Superintendent John E. Deasy said board certification helps teachers reflect on their profession in a way that often leads to faculty-room discussions about sharing lesson ideas. "Education is one of the most isolated professions," he said. "This is a very public process."

Deasy said he aims to get 10 percent of the county's teachers board-certified, up from less than 1 percent now. To accomplish this goal, Prince George's has increased its annual stipend for board-certified teachers to $5,000 from $3,000, according to the school system. That's on top of a $2,000 stipend from Maryland.

The states with the highest financial incentives tend to have the most board-certified teachers. In North Carolina, where teachers can receive a 12 percent pay increase each year they have a valid certificate, an estimated 13 percent of teachers are board-certified; in South Carolina, where teachers earn a $7,500 bump each year, about 11 percent are board-certified.

School systems vying for the best teachers often sweeten the pot.

In Virginia, the state offers a one-time stipend of $5,000 and $2,500 each year after that to board-certified teachers. But Fairfax County also pays fees for every applicant and as much as $3,500 per year to teachers that win certification. As a result, the county has more than 200 board-certified teachers.

Loudoun offers an annual bonus of slightly more than $1,000 to board-certified teachers and fee reimbursement only after certification. So far, the county system has only 12 such teachers, the same number as in the D.C. public schools, though both systems are ramping up efforts. The Loudoun School Board recently proposed raising the annual stipend to $7,500 for board-certified teachers.

"It's all about the money," said Emmet Rosenfeld, an English teacher at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, explaining why he put himself through what he described as an "excruciating" process.

Rosenfeld, who has been blogging about his application experience for Teacher Magazine, said it's still unclear whether the process will make him a stronger teacher in the long run. He added that the application takes so much time that it on occasion diverts his attention from the classroom.

There is conflicting research on whether students score better on standardized achievement tests when they have a board-certified teacher. Some analysts say they are waiting for proof that the program works.

"Outstanding teachers are those whose students show the results," said Chester E. Finn Jr., president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, based in the District. He said criteria for the certification should rely more on student test scores.

But Morales said applying for certification strengthened her approach to teaching.

The biggest change, she said, is constantly asking: Why?

Before, if students gave her an answer that was not in a textbook or that she had not thought of, she would tell them it was wrong. Now, she asks them how they came up with it.

"They always have a rationale. Maybe I didn't explain it well," she said. By learning more about their thought process, she also finds out how she can adapt lessons in the future.

She has also found that the credential raised her confidence. As a "back-door teacher" who came to the profession after a career in business management, she would sometimes wonder if her kids were learning as much as they would with a more experienced teacher.

"This is as if someone gave me the 'I'm okay,' " she said.