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What's On TAP?

From High-Profile National Panels to New Trainings — and Surprise TAP Award — More Than 650 TAP Conference Attendees Take Knowledge to the Next Level

Hundreds of teachers, administrators, district representatives, state chiefs and others involved in TAP set out for Los Angeles in anticipation of the Eighth Annual National TAP Conference — the system's biggest event of the year.

Designed to explain the intricacies of the comprehensive teacher quality reform from "on-the-ground" perspectives, the TAP conference has provided a valuable forum for existing, new and exploratory schools to get an in-depth look at TAP in policy and practice. Participants are also able to exchange best practices with other schools from across the country and learn about new developments underway.

This year's conference added a new dimension: collaboration with the Milken Family Foundation National Education Conference . Joining the two conferences under the banner of "Educators as Leaders" and led by Milken Family Foundation Chairman and TAP Founder Lowell Milken, the conference celebrated the importance of quality teachers and their integral role in preparing young people for bright futures.

TAP Founder Lowell Milken addresses conference attendees. (click image for larger view)

Partnership with the Milken National Education Conference gave TAP participants an opportunity to attend its sessions focused on reforming America's K-12 system on a broad scale as well as the Milken Educator Awards Gala — one of the most spectacular celebrations of teaching in the country.

The Power of TAP's Human Capital
Building strong human capital was Lowell Milken's top priority in creating TAP, and it remains at the core of the system's key elements of career advancement, professional growth, fair teacher accountability and performance pay. In his Keynote Address, Lowell took TAP participants through the history, philosophies and effectiveness of the system, now impacting over 60,000 students and 5,000 teachers.

"Education is without question the means most conducive to building today's scarce resource of human capital," said Lowell Milken. "Today's students are the first generation for whom excellence is being defined not by their performance here, but by how it compares to that of students around the world. Teachers are the most important school-related factor driving student achievement and building this critical human capital.

"After more than 10 years of laying the groundwork, our research confirmed that a profession of more than three million people has to undergo structural change over time. To attract, develop, retain and motivate people of talent to teach, the education profession can no longer be based on a structure devoid of the features that business for centuries has shown are necessary to attract, develop, retain and motivate people of talent: opportunities for career advancement, professional growth and competitive compensation. Encapsulating these very elements, TAP is achieving its goals."

While Lowell was highlighting TAP's achievements across the country, the staff of Forest Hill Elementary in Rapides Parish, Louisiana, was not aware that TAP's Founder would be recognizing their own achievements in a special way. Towards the end of his speech, Lowell announced the creation of the new TAP Founder's Award , which would acknowledge a school's implementation of the system to its highest standards of excellence.

Forest Hill celebrates new $50,000 TAP Founder's Award. (click image for larger view)

Forest Hill Principal Nancy Rials told her staff that the prestigious honor was what they would aim for next year. To Rials' surprise, she didn't have to wait: at that moment, Lowell announced Forest Hill as the first recipient of the TAP Founder's Award! What's more, the Award comes with a $50,000 unrestricted cash prize for the school to use to further its TAP goals.

The funds will be much appreciated at this rural Title I school, whose staff and students reached tremendous achievements since implementing TAP two years ago. Forest Hill's School Performance Score jumped from 105.2 to 124.5 in the 2005-06 school year — the largest growth in the parish. The school became one of two state Distinguished Title I Schools of the Year, and in February 2008, the Louisiana Department of Education named Forest Hill the top high-poverty school in the state.

Said Lowell, "If TAP can lead Forest Hill to the top-achieving Title I school in the state in just three years, think what a nation of TAP schools can achieve!"

On the Forefront of the National Education Reform Movement
Continued progress in improving teacher quality and student achievement across all socio-economic areas has helped catapult TAP to one of America's leading systemic reforms, incorporating career advancement, strong professional development, an instructionally focused teacher accountability system and competitive compensation.

The combination of these powerful support structures have gotten schools, districts and states to embrace a new way of doing business that brings people together to get the job done. TAP's results and ability to garner support from the bottom up have attracted broad-based support, even reaching some of the most influential policymakers overseeing America's education system.

In fact, the multi-million federal Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF), introduced in 2006, responded to this urgent call for innovative, robust incentive programs that would attract and retain top teachers — particularly in high-need areas desperate for solutions to strengthening achievement for students of diverse cultural backgrounds and income groups. TIF provides five-year grants to districts and states for the development of such systems.

L-R: Dr. Kerri Briggs of U.S. ED and NIET Distinguished Scholar Charlotte Danielson (click image for larger view)

"Effective teaching matters," said Dr. Kerri Briggs, assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education at the U.S. Department of Education. She was featured on a panel, moderated by NIET Senior Vice President Tamara W. Schiff, to discuss the key elements to assessing teacher effectiveness. "We will continue our work on the Teacher Incentive Fund as it is important to see states at the local level address this real issue."

Charlotte Danielson, educational consultant and NIET distinguished scholar, noted that it is "essential to promote high-level teaching. First we have to define it, then assess it." She is helping to design advanced training materials for TAP to help teachers and administrators do exactly that — and more.

"Working together," Briggs concluded, "we can have mentoring, data and professional development" needed to effectively assess teacher performance.

States and districts implementing TAP received a significant portion of TIF funds to expand and enhance their plans, from large urban districts like Chicago, to rural areas in South Carolina. South Carolina received a total of $40 million in TIF funds — the largest share of TIF funds so far. The federal government has pushed for more support of these comprehensive systems in discussions surrounding the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (NCLB).

House Education Committee Senior Republican Howard "Buck" McKeon (click image for larger view)

Debate on NCLB's teacher quality provisions includes support of components key to TAP, such as career ladders and performance-based compensation based on multiple measures of effectiveness. House Education Committee Chairman George Miller and Senior Republican Member Howard "Buck" McKeon have been leaders in these discussions.

"No Child Left Behind is the most historic federal education reform on which I've worked," said McKeon, who welcomed educators to the conference. "It made sweeping improvements to our education system. I've also learned that no law is perfect, and that's why at the end of five years, we look at it and ask, 'What has really happened, how has it been put into effect, and what can we do about making it better?'"

"At the core of this discussion is each one of you," he continued. "When it comes to improving student achievement, nothing compares to the amazing power of a first-rate teacher."

House Education Committee Chairman George Miller (left) cites TAP as an effective teacher quality model. (click image for larger view)

Chairman Miller joined in a panel moderated by Lowell Milken with Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent David Brewer III, former U.S. Education Secretary Bill Bennett and former SC Superintendent of Education Inez Tenenbaum to discuss recent efforts of taking a multi-pronged approach to revitalizing the teaching profession — and the implications of these efforts as we look to NCLB reauthorization and a new presidency.

Chairman Miller explained the importance of reforming the law to better attract and retain highly effective teachers, citing TAP as a model to follow.

"In TAP, we see that you can bring people together. You can redesign a workplace to be high-performing and to be a team that can have embedded, ongoing, onsite professional development," said Miller. "This is about all-the-time, ongoing professional development. It's about the mentoring of teachers, building teams, including the principals and peer observations. It's about sharing your talents, your tricks, your experience and your knowledge so that all of the teachers will be able to differentiate instruction based upon the needs of their schools."

MN Governor Tim Pawlenty, author of Q Comp, based on TAP, and former SC Superintendent of Education Inez Tenenbaum (click image for larger view)

Along with creating this cohesive teacher corps is the responsibility to offer rewards for a job well done. "We have to take the next generation on the issue of high-quality teachers and deal with performance pay, designed by teachers, designed cooperatively with local schools and to make that performance necessary," Miller added.

"The U.S. Department of Education had the index model, then the growth model and now we're having differentiated accountability. We need to have common standards, common standard of proficiency or grade level or whatever you're going to call it," said Inez Tenenbaum. "We need to have the best practices — and I think TAP is one of those outlined so that schools and districts can take that, go to scale and have really great intervention models that are funded in part by the federal government."

Minnesota has been a pioneer in taking TAP's tenets as a foundation for its own comprehensive performance and professional pay program, Q Comp (Quality Compensation).

MN's Edison High Assistant Principal Latanya Daniels (right) (click image for larger view)

"For the most part the teaching profession is a longitudinal experience that's built on a career model of the 1950s, when in fact, now people are cycling in and out of careers much more quickly," said Pawlenty, explaining the need for a total restructuring of the profession. "We have to get the nation's best and brightest oriented toward teaching and staying in teaching. The best and brightest teachers are not being assigned to areas of the highest need. The best and brightest teachers in too many cases are leaving the profession within the first five years of employment. We don't have robust training and continuous improvement programs in place like we should." Since Pawlenty authored Q Comp in 2005, 39 districts and 21 charters have enrolled in the program, with several more districts planning to apply.

In Minneapolis, TAP has yielded additional benefits such as cultivating leadership in the school building and developing a mutual sense of accountability, which have been critical to TAP school Edison High's progress in leading students to greater achievement. Latanya Daniels, assistant principal at the school, joined in a panel with Milken Educators and TAP participants, to talk about the importance of enhancing a school's culture. Daniels has seen a 16 percent graduation increase to 77 percent — the largest in the district — thanks to TAP. "My job is to ensure that the bar is high," she said. "I hold all students accountable because I expect to work in a school culture of excellence, and I'm happy to be a part of developing that."

Kevin Guitterrez (middle) of the Algiers Charter Schools Association, New Orleans (click image for larger view)

Kevin Guitterrez, chief academic officer of the Algiers Charter Schools Association (ACSA) in New Orleans, took on strengthening schools as the foundation for rebuilding a community. In 2005, the year ACSA was created, the organization adopted TAP as the "backbone" of its education strategy. The schools have 93 percent of the student body on free and reduced-price lunch, and were among the first to open in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Guitterrez explained the need for a sustainable system like TAP that would build capacity from within the schools to combat the myriad educational challenges the area faced under these unique circumstances. "We knew we needed to turn things around, and really put something into place that would allow teachers to become better at their trade." After just one year of TAP, the students at ACSA schools scored over 22% higher than their neighboring peers, with potential to achieve much more.

TAP in Practice
What happens when you have the critical elements in place to implement TAP? The myriad TAP breakout sessions sought to address hot TAP topics, ranging from starting a new TAP school, the responsibilities of mentor and master teachers and implementing data-driven professional development, to the ins and outs of value-added assessment, acclimating to a fair, transparent evaluation system, and implementing and sustaining TAP after three years.

The panelists driving these discussions were TAP teachers and administrators from their own experiences of TAP's day-to-day implementation. These sessions provided a unique opportunity for new schools to learn valuable tricks of the trade, and veteran schools to learn how to take the system to a deeper level.

Mary Bell, master teacher at A.A. Nelson Elementary School in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and a product of TAP's multiple career path element, admitted that implementing TAP was an adjustment. "I was teaching with the door closed for 18 years and was comfortable," says Bell, who before TAP used to receive two evaluations per year. "But TAP is not just teaching to the manual; it's just good teaching. TAP taught teachers what the rubric means and how to prepare well for it. Now the teachers' doors are open."

This shared knowledge, generated by the ongoing TAP "cluster group" meetings each week, has made a tremendous difference in enhancing the overall culture of TAP schools — even in areas of highest need.

AR's Stephens Elementary Principal Sharon Brooks (far right) (click image for larger view)

"There are two key things to TAP's success: consistency and cluster groups," said Sharon Brooks, principal of Stephens Elementary School in Little Rock, Arkansas, where 98 percent of the students are on free and reduced-price lunch. "We are building TAP into the school culture, organizing cluster groups every week and looking at data. High-quality teachers from magnet schools are coming to TAP schools because of the professional development."

"TAP's professional development is personal development," said Todd Walker, master teacher at South High School in Columbus, Ohio, who started as a mentor teacher. "The beauty of TAP is that you work all the processes. You become a reflective teacher, always enabling your practice and skill level to increase. TAP gives you the opportunity to continue growing within the context of the school."

After just one year of TAP, South High School's state rating jumped from "Academic Watch" to "Continuous Improvement" for the 2005-06 school year. The school was able to maintain its "Continuous Improvement" rating for 2006-07.

New Developments: Principal Evaluation and Compensation; and Advanced TAP Training
In addition to the in-depth look at TAP's elements in practice, conference attendees were able to dig deeper into the other processes that make up TAP. This year's conference presented plans underway to evaluate and reward principals — as required by TIF — and previewed an exciting advanced training module designed by NIET Training Senior Vice President Todd White and Education Consultant and NIET Distinguished Scholar Charlotte Danielson.

Building on the TAP model, NIET has performed increased research in developing evaluation and compensation systems for principals, in addition to teachers. Some of the findings illuminated that the major goal of the evaluation should be improved professional and organizational performance. Standards and performance expectations used to evaluate principals should be locally developed and the evaluation system should provide principals with the opportunity to change, improve and make better decisions.

In terms of determining rewards for principals in TAP schools, factors to include should be schoolwide student achievement, effective leadership based on observations of behaviors aligned to specific standards, and taking on additional responsibilities.

TAP has come a long way since it was introduced in 1999. But perhaps one of the most powerful aspects of TAP is that it continues to grow, not only helping to make good teachers great, but also great teachers even better. Driving TAP is the belief that education is a lifelong process with lasting benefits. In this vein, the advanced instructional design program was created for those who understand TAP's core processes, and are ready to take their craft to the next level.

In anticipation of the advanced training session to be scheduled for this fall, Todd White and Charlotte Danielson previewed the kinds of strategies to help engage students and promote higher level critical thinking skills.

A preview of the new TAP advanced training module (click image for larger view)

"The crux of the training is: how do you design instruction to engage kids at high levels and get them excited about different solutions to a problem?" said White.

As an example, they illustrated a math strategy to design a dog run with 64 linear feet of fencing so that it has the largest area. "Creating these types of problems that elicit a series of questions about the way the run has to be built, its shape, dimensions and other characteristics, promotes innovative answers and allows students to repeatedly compute the math equations to get there," White continued. "It's a win-win."

Said Jodie Wymore, principal of Fuentes Elementary School in Kyle, Texas, "Becoming a TAP school has been the most challenging and most rewarding experience — beyond what I ever expected in a short amount of time."

And what a road ahead!