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It's no secret that schools serving the most disadvantaged students face the toughest challenges in attracting and retaining effective teachers.  As a result, the poorest, most vulnerable students--those who need our help most--are least likely to attend schools with fully qualified staff members.

One promising solution is attracting attention:  Urban Teacher Residency programs.  These programs combine master's-level education coursework with clinical teaching experience in actual urban classrooms.  According to a recent article in Voices in Urban Education, these programs are showing early success in poor urban schools.  Ninety percent of graduates from a Boston program--and 95 percent of graduates from a similar program in Chicago--are still teaching three years after graduation.  Compare that to national urban school retention rates, which typically run between 30 and 50 percent.

The programs succeed by combining some essential ingredients of successful teacher retention programs:  mentoring, professional collaboration, school/university partnerships, on-going support for teachers, and concrete links between research and classroom practice.  ...

Welcome back to school!  Many of you are now preparing back-to-school presentations, columns, and other communications.  The Learning First Alliance--which sponsors Public School Insights--has just released language you can use in your back-to-school communications.  You have our permission to use it all or in part, as your needs dictate.

Our sample language outlines an emerging vision for 21^st century public schools, a vision that is already taking shape in schools from coast to coast.  It reaffirms the extraordinary mission of our public schools and encourages strong partnerships among public schools, citizens and communities.

Feel free to steal our words.  Make them your own.

You can download the language here.   ...

Charles Murray is apparently at it again in his forthcoming book, Real Education.

Murray's 1994 book, The Bell Curve, infamously argued that demography is destiny. It held that members of certain racial and socioeconomic groups are poor because they're not smart enough to be otherwise.  Real Education apparently applies this objectionable principle to education, with the expected results.  

If the book excerpts in the Wall Street Journal are any indication, the book will argue that low-performing students lack the intelligence to perform well.  It will counsel schools to put these students out of their academic misery by tracking them into less intellectually-ambitious, more strictly vocational courses. ...

Harvard professor and cultural critic Henry Louis Gates, Jr. captured some 25 million viewers with his riveting PBS documentary series, African American Lives (WNET). Using genealogical research and DNA science, Gates traces the family history of 19 famous African Americans. What results is a rich and moving account of the African American experience.

Gates recently spoke with Public School Insights about the documentary and a remarkable idea it inspired in him: To use genealogy and DNA research to revolutionize the way we teach history and science to African American Students. Now, Gates is working with other educators to create an "ancestry-based curriculum" in K-12 schools. Many African American students know little about their ancestors. Given the chance to examine their own DNA and family histories, Gates argues, they are likely to become more engaged in their history and science classes. As they rescue their forebears from the anonymity imposed by slavery, students begin to understand their own place in the American story.

If the stories in African American Lives are any guide, they're in for an experience.

The Significance of African American Lives

PUBLIC SCHOOL INSIGHTS: Tell me about "African-American Lives" and its significance, in your view.

GATES: Wow, that's a big question. [Laughing] I got the idea in the middle of the night to do a series for public television that would combine genealogy and ancestry tracing through genetics. I've been fascinated with my own family tree since I was 10 years old - that's the year that my grandfather died. ...