A blogger’s recent criticism of Teach for America gave pause for reflection. Critics of the program are not new. Such dialogue is essential to the healthy development of public policy and programs that best meet the goals of serving all children equitably and in particular, closing the achievement gap that persists in racial and socioeconomic categories. Here are some points to consider in the discussion, which essentially boils down to a cost-benefit analysis about where and how we can most effectively invest in public education.

1. Teaching is important. Even Bill Gates acknowledges this, albeit quite late in the game.  Good teaching does not appear from thin air. Nor does it exist soley because a credential says it does.  Leadership and administrative support of instructional staff is also critical (and too often absent).  Parents are also the primary educators. The ability to engage them in a student’s academic life is an important part of a teacher’s role. Are these factors all part of the statistic? I doubt it. They are hard to define, harder still to quantify and yet they are part of TFA’s emphasis and training. Without them, comprehensive change will fail. A team oriented approach will prevail when the team works together.

When evaluating teacher impact on student achievement, it is important to note that not all states require cohort assessment. In other words, they evaluate the position, i.e. 7th grade science, on an annual basis. This type of measurement fails to account for individual teacher impact on a particular cohort of students. For example, it is most effective to look at a particular group of students and measure their progress from year to year under the influence of a particular teacher.  This is often difficult when there is teacher turnover. Turnover occurs when a teacher leaves and a new teacher is needed, creating a transition. In my experience, there were four teachers in the same 7th grade math classroom - all “highly qualified” - in a single academic year. None of them were TFA. I was at the school two years, but was re-assigned based on the needs of the school, in my second year.  Had the school remained open, and had I stayed, the chances were that I would be re-assigned again because the transient nature of low-income areas promulgates constant and dynamic change. Does this statistic take such considerations into account?

The criticism looks only at teacher turnover. It does not look at the number of TFA alums who may transition to another high needs school, who start schools and programs that  or may even stay in their original placement but take on an administrative role.  It also does not look at the number of alums who were initially only committed to two years and have stayed at their placement school ever since. Numbers are just that. Without a thorough and honest basis for analysis, we cannot assess how best to adapt and improve.

2. Teach for America has a two part mission - the second of which is alumni-focused and seeks to utilize the collective knowledge and experience to comprehensively address the issue of education as something that is solvable. No matter what the corps member chooses to do as an alumni, they take the experience with them and use it - consciously or not - to effect change, even if the change is simply bearing witness to the existence of the gap and the factors inhibiting its ability to desist, which is important as well. There are many alumni who stay in schools as teachers and administrators.  They are effecting important change, even if it is not in the same spot they were as corps members. When alumni go on to create strong education related organizations that support classroom teachers, they are still involved. When they attend policy and professional schools and address other social and community needs, they have a better understanding of what will and what won’t work. Implementation trumps policy and there is no better experience that first-hand knowledge of the constraints that impact the best laid plans.  Knowledge and awareness is cliche, but cannot be avoided in breaking down prejudices and misunderstandings about the capacity of children to learn and the ways in which access to education has been most unacceptably disparate.  The criticism fails to account for the ongoing and growing critical mass that such experience provides to the ability to effect change.

As alumni, our biggest downfall is to focus on the rock-stars of education reform that make the TFA prototype seem unachievable. The fact of the matter is that systemic impact takes time and resources to develop. But every day, and in many unrecognized ways, our alumni are making a difference, and working with others to promote viral acceptance of the import and challenge of providing equity in education.

3. Public education is a public investment in our children. Unfortunately, the allocation of this investment has favored those who already have and left those who haven’t way behind. Resources to schools have universally increased over the past few decades, including significant increases in faculty and staff salaries. These salaries are not at all correlated to student results and so a cost-benefit analysis should necessarily include and distinguish in detail what funds are spent on resources and how effective they are. As such, per-pupil-funding is not independently correlated to successful students and should be viewed with heavy skepticism. The criticism does not detail where the public costs associated with supporting a corps member come from, but about half could be accounted for by the salary the school district provides - to every teacher, regardless of TFA affiliation or not.  The criticism also does not reflect the investment of high-achieving, high-wealth districts located in and around the most under-resourced and under-performing schools. There are other district-specific resources provided through public and private funds to all new teachers.  Thus, it is difficult to truly understand the cost-benefits by assigning a random number to teacher cost.

Perhaps the most intangible and unquantifiable of resources is the network that TFA provides. Anecdotally it is effective and unparralleled.

And finally, there is no single answer to education reform. Just as no boilerplate school model will work in every community and with every child, no one approach will solve all of the challenges that have contributed to the creation and continuance of the achievement gap and our system’s failures to provide every child with the opportunity to attain an excellent education. We must encourage the committment and innovation of programs like Teach for America and its progeny because they are inspiration and collaboration in the solution to the biggest and most important threat to our future.

I have had the privilege of not only being a Teach for America corps member (Bay Area ‘99), but also participating in the interview process since 2001 as an evaluator. The objectivity of the process, the rigorous metrics used and the equity of the system is unparralleled. There are so many amazing and outstanding applicants to the program, and the commitment to selecting . It is not a perfect program or the only answer. But it is a an option that reflects on criticism, commits to constant improvement and is helping build our country’s consciousness about the fact that educational inequity is intolerable.

Here’s more on the debate from another blogger, emphasizing the complexity of the issues and the need for a focus on facts.