110 HR 2617 IH: Preparing Excellent Teachers Act of
U.S. House of Representatives
2007-06-07
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EN
Pursuant to Title 17 Section 105 of the United States Code, this file is not subject to copyright protection and is in the public domain.
1.This Act may be cited as the
Preparing Excellent Teachers Act of
2007
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2.Congress finds the following:
(1)The shortage of qualified teachers in the
United States has reached critical levels.
(2)Education experts agree that looming
teacher retirement and shortages of effective teachers in low-performing
schools create a great demand for quality teachers.
(3)Nearly 50 percent
of new teachers leave in the first 5 years.
(4)These numbers have
a direct impact on the quality of the education of the children of the United
States.
(5)Inexperienced
teachers are less effective than teachers with several years of experience.
Successful teacher preparation programs, providing ongoing support, can make
novice teachers effective more rapidly. The majority of new teachers lack such
support, and so leave the profession before becoming effective.
(6)Teacher candidates
must see expert practices modeled and must then practice them with ongoing
mentoring support. Teacher preparation often fails to provide the opportunity
to learn under the direct supervision of expert teachers working in schools
that effectively serve high-need students. Student teaching is too often
conducted in classrooms that do not model effective practice, or in classrooms
that do not serve high-need students, and the lessons learned do not generalize
to effective teaching in high-need schools.
(7)It is critical to
develop programs that increase the probability recruits will succeed and stay
in the high-need classrooms where they are needed. Because many teacher
candidates choose to teach where they grew up or went to college, it is
important to have strong programs in hard-to-staff urban and rural locations.
Teacher residency programs effectively build teacher supply, since they recruit
and prepare candidates in the districts that sponsor them. Teacher residency
programs have demonstrated the capacity to recruit, prepare, retain, and
provide effective support for teachers in high-need schools.
3.Grants for
teacher residency programs
(a)Part C of title II of the Elementary and Secondary
Education Act of 1965 is amended by adding at the end the following:
6Teacher Residency
Programs
2371.Grants for
teacher residency programs
(a)From amounts made available to carry out this section,
the Secretary shall make grants to high-need local educational agencies to
assist such agencies to establish and support teacher residency programs. Such
agencies are encouraged to work with non-profit community-based organizations
that have experience in teacher residency programs.
(b)Teacher
residency programs
(1)For
purposes of this section, the term teacher residency program means
a school-based teacher preparation program in which a prospective
teacher—
(A)teaches alongside
a teacher of record (who is designated as the mentor teacher) for at least 1
academic year;
(B)receives
coursework in the teaching of the content area in which the teacher will become
certified to teach;
(C)receives
instruction in planning, content, pedagogy, student learning, and assessment,
management of the classroom environment, and professional responsibilities,
including interaction with families and colleagues and use of assessment data
to modify and improve instruction;
(D)attains full State
certification to teach prior to completion of the program; and
(E)receives a midpoint review.
(2)To receive assistance under this section, a
teacher residency program shall be designed to meet the following
characteristics of successful programs:
(A)Teacher residency programs integrate
pedagogy and classroom practice by partnering with institutions of higher
education to ensure residents engage in rigorous master’s level coursework
while undertaking a guided teaching apprenticeship. Lessons learned from the
residency program will be used to inform teacher training at the institution of
higher education.
(B)Residents teach
alongside an experienced mentor teacher. Experienced mentor teachers complement
the residency program so that classroom clinical practice is tightly aligned
with coursework. Experienced mentor teachers may receive additional
compensation for participating in the program.
(C)Experienced mentor
teachers shall have extra responsibilities as teacher leaders of the teacher
residency program, as mentors for residents, and as teacher coaches during the
induction of novice teachers. These responsibilities include establishing,
within the program, a learning community in which all individuals are expected
to continually improve their capacity to advance student learning.
(D)The director of
the teacher residency program shall establish and publish clear criteria for
selection of experienced mentor teachers based on measures of teacher
effectiveness and the appropriate subject area knowledge. Evaluation of teacher
effectiveness shall be based on observation of domains including each of the
following:
(i)Planning and
preparation, including demonstrated knowledge of content, pedagogy, and
assessment, including the use of formative assessment to improve student
learning.
(ii)Appropriate
instruction that engages students with different learning styles.
(iii)Collaboration
with colleagues to improve instruction.
(iv)Appropriate and
fair analysis of gains in student learning. When feasible, this shall include
valid and reliable objective measure of the influence of teachers on the rate
of student academic progress.
(E)Teacher residency
programs group teacher candidates in cohorts to facilitate professional
collaboration among residents.
(F)Teacher residency
programs admissions goals and priorities are developed in concert with the
hiring objectives of the local educational agency, which commits to hire
graduates from the residency program. Residents learn to teach in the same
district in which they will work, learning the instructional initiatives and
curriculum of the district.
(G)Teacher residency
programs support residents once they are hired as teachers of record.
Residencies continue to provide professional development and networking
opportunities to support residents through their first years of
teaching.
(3)Experienced
mentor teacher definedIn this section, the term
experienced mentor teacher means a teacher who—
(A)has at least five
years teaching experience teaching in a school in the high-need local
educational agency that is the recipient of a grant under this section;
and
(B)has a masters
degree in education or teaching.
(c)Persons eligible
To participateTo be eligible
to participate in a teacher residency program under this section, a mid-career
professional or recent college graduate shall become enrolled simultaneously in
a masters degree program in education or teaching in a university or college
that—
(1)has entered into a
written agreement relating to such program with the high-need local educational
agency that is the recipient of a grant under this section; and
(2)is accredited by
the Council of Higher Education Accreditation and the accrediting agency in the
State in which the high-need local educational agency is located, if
any.
(d)Participants To
receive practical experienceA participant in a teacher residency
program under this section shall, under the supervision of an experienced
mentor teacher, complete not fewer than ten months teaching a class containing
not more than 30 students in a school chosen by the high-need local educational
agency that is the recipient of a grant under this section.
(e)Participant To
agree To be placed in a schoolA participant in a teacher
residency program under this section shall agree in writing to be placed, after
successfully completing the program, as a teacher in a school chosen by the
high-need local educational agency. Such placement shall be for a period of at
least 5 academic years beginning with the academic year that begins after the
participant successfully completes the program. The school chosen for the
placement shall be in a high-need, underserved area. A participant who fails to
complete the period of the placement (or the first 5 academic years of the
placement, if the period is more than 5 academic years) is required to pay back
the cost of the training.
(f)Amount, number,
and distribution of grants
(1)A
grant under this section shall be for a period of three years, and shall
include $2,500,000 for the first year, $1,500,000 for the second year, and
$1,000,000 for the third year.
(2)The
Secretary may not make more than ten such grants each fiscal year, beginning
with fiscal year 2008.
(3)A
high-need local educational agency may receive not more than one grant in each
fiscal year.
(g)To
receive a grant under this section, a high-need local educational agency shall
submit to the Secretary an application at such time, in such manner, and
containing such information as the Secretary may prescribe.
(h)The
Secretary shall award grants under this section on a competitive basis.
(i)Of
the amounts appropriated to carry out this section, the Secretary shall reserve
up to 5 percent for an evaluation of the effectiveness of the program
established under this section, in relation to the effectiveness of other
programs that prepare teachers for employment with high-need schools and
high-need local educational agencies, including, where feasible, value-added
measures of learning gains of students taught by graduates of each teacher
residency Program, to be conducted by the Institute of Education Sciences, the
National Science Foundation, or the National Academy of Sciences, at the
direction of the Secretary. Not later than 5 years after the date of the
enactment of this section, the Secretary shall make the results of the
evaluation public.
(j)A high-need local educational agency that receives a grant
under this section shall provide matching funds in an amount equal to 50
percent of grant funds provided to the agency under this section to carry out
the activities supported by the grant, which may be provided by community
partners, institutions of higher education, or others.
(k)High-need local
educational agency definedIn this section, the term
high-need local educational agency means a local educational
agency—
(1)that is among the
highest 20 percent of local educational agencies in the State in terms of
percentage of students from families with incomes below the poverty line (as
defined in section 9101(33) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of
1965 (20 U.S.C. 7801(33)));
(2)that is among the
lowest 20 percent of local educational agencies in the State on assessments
required under part A of title I, or, where feasible, the lowest 20 percent of
local educational agencies in the State in terms of measures of teaching
effectiveness; and
(3)for which there is
a high percentage of classes taught by teachers not teaching in the academic
subjects or grade levels that the teachers were prepared to teach.
(l)Authorization of
appropriationsThere are authorized to be appropriated to the
Secretary $50,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2008 through 2012 to carry out
this section. Amounts appropriated are authorized to remain available until
expended, and may be used by the Secretary to make additional grants, in
accordance with this section, in a fiscal year beginning with fiscal year
2013.
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(b)The table of contents for that Act is amended by
inserting after the item relating to section 2368 the following:
Subpart 6—Teacher Residency
Programs
Sec. 2371. Grants for teacher residency
programs.
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