Check out the new post over in Ariel Sacks’ phenomenal blog “On the Shoulders of Giants.” Ariel, a dedicated and talented young New York City teacher, represented the Teacher Leaders Network and CTQ’s TeacherSolutions 2030 initiative at a recent Ford Foundation gathering on the Strategic Management of Human Capital.
As the single teacher among university professors, foundation officers, education economists, and policymakers, Ariel, alone in this group, experiences daily the most challenging of environments — a classroom of students in a high-needs school who rely on her to provide them with the skills and confidence to succeed. I was thrilled that the other participants recognized this value, and second Lisa Delpit’s suggestion, that all of us in education should “really be interviewing Ariel” and all of the other highly accomplished teachers who tackle the highest hurdles for the sake of their students’ learning. If you need any further proof of the value of teacher experience, simply skim the wisdom Ariel shares throughout the rest of her post.
Ford is one of the few foundations focused on not just recruiting talent for high need schools, but also retaining that talent. Watch out for TeacherSolutions: Teacher Working Conditions 2.0 — another new initiative of CTQ. Ford is supporting CTQ to not only deepen our understanding of working conditions — but also to bring the voices of other expert teachers to light around the issues they encounter daily and that impact student learning and teacher retention.
In other words, how do we populate our classrooms with more Ariel Sacks? I know CTQ’s emerging work will not offer any silver bullet solutions, but I also know that all of us who strive for equity in American education, and all of the students whose lives you have touched, stand – humbled and awed – on your shoulders, Ariel.
