Teaching Matters Introduces Digital Badges for Teacher-Leaders
Teaching
Matters, a nonprofit that focuses on improving teacher
effectiveness, will
launch a pilot program in which it gives "micro-credentials" to teachers
who demonstrate the skills necessary to improve student achievement and
sustain
effective instruction in urban schools.
Teaching
Matters
will offer the micro-credentials, "digital badges," in a pilot program
involving 150 teachers in New York City schools that will have meta-data
embedded in them to provide evidence of the teachers' expertise and
capacity to
lead.
At
the
heart of the program will be a process that involves recruiting
potential
teacher-leaders, coaching, observing the teachers at work and data
collection.
It
is
one of several programs the nonprofit is involved in to support teachers
in
urban school districts, primarily New York City.
The
micro-credentialing
pilot for teacher-leaders was announced October 22 at the
Council of Great City Schools (CGCS) annual conference in Milwaukee.
CGCS is an
association of the 100 largest school districts in the United States
that
brings together superintendents and policy makers from urban areas to
share
best practices.
Teaching
Matters'
micro-credentialing program will join other programs it has developed
over the last 20 years to assist teacher-leaders who can then pass on
their
best practices and skills to their colleagues. It includes the
nonprofit's:
- Teaching
for Impact program, which identifies the leaders in 200
New York City schools and helps them create professional learning
communities
at their schools;
- Writing
Matters program, which is grounded in the best
practices for writing instruction; and
- Voices
and Choices,
which introduces students to the foundations, issues and
responsibilities of democracy and citizenship via an annual citywide
Civil
Rights Summit or Constitution Today Town Meeting.
About the Author
Michael Hart is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer and the former executive editor of THE Journal.