Often used interchangeably with terms like “strategic staffing” or “strategic school staffing,” reimagining the teaching role involves disrupting traditional approaches to teaching. It encourages innovative solutions, like teacher teams to manage the instruction of larger classrooms, flexible scheduling, and new roles for teachers that allow them to advance in their careers while staying in the classroom, thus making the profession more sustainable—and ultimately leading to improved student outcomes.
Research shows that teachers improve as they stay in the classroom longer, and high rates of teacher turnover are bad for student outcomes. Therefore, a more experienced workforce is likely to be a more effective one. This research summary examines the research behind key components of strategic staffing models, such as formalized teacher leadership and mentorship, differentiated compensation, teacher working conditions, teacher collaboration, and class size adjustments. It also highlights early evaluation data of several of the models themselves.