Teachers Trained by TNTP Among Louisiana’s Most Effective

The New Teacher Project Earns Top Ratings for Preparing Exceptionally Effective Teachers in Math and Reading

NEW ORLEANS, LA – The New Teacher Project’s teacher preparation program ranks among Louisiana’s most effective, according to a new state-sponsored study by researchers at Louisiana State University. New teachers enrolled in TNTP’s Louisiana Practitioner Teacher Program (LPTP) earn their certification while teaching—a rigorous, field-based approach that accelerates teachers’ post-certification impact on student learning. It is specifically designed to help career changers who are new to teaching be immediately effective in high-need schools.

More than 1,000 teachers have been certified or are pending certification through the LPTP, the first non-university teacher preparation program in Louisiana. The program currently serves ten districts in the New Orleans, Shreveport and Baton Rouge areas, including the Recovery School District of New Orleans. Teachers certified or pending certification by LPTP include 810 Teach For America corps members, 67 teachers recruited by TNTP’s teachNOLA program, and 179 teachers from the Teach Baton Rouge program, all of which serve high-need schools.

The study, “Value Added Assessment of Teacher Preparation in Louisiana: 2005-2006 to 2007-2008,” is part of an ongoing research project examining the effect of recent graduates of Louisiana teacher education programs on student achievement. Controlling for student past performance and school environment, the model shows how much teachers certified by each program contribute to student learning. Ten teacher preparation programs were studied, and each was assigned performance levels ranging from 1 to 5, based on the effectiveness of their teachers by subject area.

The latest results for TNTP’s program show that it consistently produces effective teachers, especially for the foundational subject areas of math and reading.

• In math, TNTP earned a Level 1 rating, the only program to do so. Level 1 indicates that teachers from the program “are more effective than experienced teachers.” TNTP-trained teachers had a positive effect estimate on student achievement of 5.7 points, 8.4 points higher than the mean for all programs studied. By comparison, the study’s authors calculate that being eligible for free or reduced price lunch has a negative effect of 2.8 on a student’s academic achievement; therefore, having a math teacher trained by TNTP more than compensates for this disadvantage of poverty. The program has certified 182 math teachers to date.
• In reading, TNTP was also the only program to earn a Level 1 rating. TNTP-trained teachers had an effect estimate of 4.1, almost 7 points higher than the mean. By comparison, students designated as being of Limited English Proficiency (LEP) suffer from a negative average effect of 4.3; in other words, TNTP-trained teachers may be effective enough to make up the gap by which students with limited English proficiency normally lag behind other students in reading.
• In English language arts and science, TNTP’s program was rated “Level 2.” A Level 2 rating indicates that teachers certified by the program have an effect on student achievement that “is more similar to experienced teachers than new teachers” in these areas.

“This study adds to the mounting track record of success for TNTP’s Louisiana Practitioner Teacher Program,” said Ariela Rozman, Chief Executive Officer of The New Teacher Project. “The results demonstrate that careful selection, rigorous training and an unwavering focus on effective instruction are the essential ingredients of a program that prepares teachers to have a dramatic impact on the performance of poor and minority students.”

The study results will inform TNTP’s ongoing efforts to improve its teacher certification programs nationwide. TNTP currently operates similar programs in six states including Louisiana. The accountability system also helps ensure that districts and schools are able to assess the effectiveness of teacher providers, to ensure that students get the teachers they need to learn and grow.

“We applaud Louisiana's commitment to understanding teachers’ effect on student achievement and for holding teacher certification programs accountable,” said Timothy Daly, President of The New Teacher Project. “No other state has been able to show so clearly where its best teachers are coming from. This approach is one of the reasons why we believe Louisiana is strongly positioned for federal Race to the Top funding. It embodies the focus on transparency, effective use of data, differentiation of teachers, and improving student outcomes that Secretary Duncan and President Obama have called for from states and school districts nationwide.”

For more information on the study, please visit:
http://www.regents.state.la.us/Academic/TE/Value%20Added.htm
http://www.regents.state.la.us/pdfs/PubAff/2009/Value%20Added_08-27-09.pdf