What city is home to the Wright Brothers and the birthplace of the Trapper Keeper?
If you said Dayton, Ohio, then you would be right! Dayton is also the location
of NCTQ’s latest district study on teacher quality, the eleventh in a series
examining how policies and practices affecting teachers play out on the ground.
In many aspects, Dayton can serve as a model for other
districts across the nation to follow. Unlike
other places we’ve studied, the district and teachers’ union in Dayton have a
well-functioning working relationship with frequent collaboration. Both the
district and the union understand the value of improving practices affecting
teachers, and have been commended nationally for their ability to rise above
messy in-fighting that so often plagues other districts.
While there are commendable practices in Dayton, there is
still significant room for improvement. Like many other urban districts across
the nation, Dayton students perform far below their suburban peers in terms of
proficiency in math and reading on the Ohio Achievement Assessments.
In total,
this report makes 29 recommendations to the district and union and five recommendations
to the state that can improve the policies shaping the quality of the Dayton
workforce and, in turn, student outcomes. The most urgent recommendations are focused on improving
teacher staffing policies:
- Hire teachers earlier. Implementing a formal
hiring timeline whereby all positions are filled by June, would benefit the
district immensely. Key deadlines should be communicated to school leaders well
in advance. Moving up the displacement and voluntary transfer process to late
spring would allow the district to focus on new hires well before the start of
the school year. - Give principals the authority to decide who
works in their buildings. The district should negotiate with the teachers union
to commit to allowing principals to interview and select candidates for all
vacancies in every school. At a minimum, principals should be able to reject
the assignment of a teacher to their school, including teachers who have lost
their assignment in another school no matter what the reason, and extend this
authority to all points in the school year.
In the past, Dayton has been known for innovation across a
variety of sectors. It is time for the district to welcome innovative changes that
will result in recruiting and retaining the best and the brightest teachers.
The next generation of students and
the city of Dayton will see the benefits of these changes for years to
come.
Read the full report here.
