The New Faces of Ed Reform

Now that Michelle Rhee and Joel Klein are (at least temporarily) out of the education reform spotlight, who will be the new faces of education reform? Perhaps the same people who've always quietly led their own teaching and learning revolutions.

In advance of next Monday's National Day of Blogging for Real Education Reform, we pulled 10 articles from our EL archives that discuss reforming education with teachers as leaders and partners in meaningful, lasting change:

• "Change From Within": How a school turned itself around, thanks to its on-site experts working together.
• "Short on Power, Long on Responsibility": To upgrade teacher quality, schools need to go beyond just holding teachers more accountable. They need to give teachers more control.
• "Lessons from Leading Models": What can we learn from the three most widely used high school reform models (Talent Development, First Things First, and career academies)?
• "Reform: To What End?": Mike Rose says that we need a different orientation to school reform—one that embodies a richer understanding of teaching and learning.
• "When Teachers Run the School": A Greek high school demonstrates the effectiveness of distributed leadership.
• "How North Carolina Improved Teacher Evaluation": For the last three years, North Carolina has been developing a statewide system to ensure that teachers can perform at their best.
• "To Help and Not Hinder": What school qualities contribute most to teacher growth?
• "Research Says… / Drastic School Turnaround Strategies Are Risky": Successful turnarounds build the skills and knowledge of those responsible for student learning and seriously engage teachers and the community in setting goals and putting them into practice.
• "How to Become a Digital Leader": Bill Ferriter says, "I've never made more enemies than I did while sitting on a panel of teacher leaders at a conference for principals. Our task was to help a room full of administrators understand the role teachers could play in driving change in schools."
• "Moving Beyond Talk": Six conditions helped these urban districts launch—and sustain—strong learning communities.

Participating in the November 22, 2010, Day of Blogging for Real Education Reform? Drop us your link on Twitter @ASCD_Inservice.