Mayor, Boston Public Schools, Boston Plan for Excellence, and Strategic Grant Partners announce Boston Teacher Residency

BOSTON -- Taking a lesson from the teaching hospital model, Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino and the Boston Public Schools (BPS) announced today the Boston Teacher Residency (BTR), a privately funded teacher preparation and certification program designed much like a medical residency.

Boston Teacher Residency is a 12-month program that will train aspiring teachers under the supervision of an experienced Master Teacher in a Boston public school. With this initiative, the BPS will be able not only to train and certify incoming teachers in areas of greatest need such as science and math but also to tailor their preparation to the district's instructional priorities.

Mayor Menino and Superintendent Thomas W. Payzant joined with the Boston Plan for Excellence (BPE) and Strategic Grant Partners (SGP) to make the announcement. The Mayor noted that Boston has an international reputation for first-class medical care and that using their model for on-the-job training, the school district will be able to utilize the skill and experience of current teachers to train the educators of the future.

"Who better to help prepare our incoming teachers than our current staff of veteran teachers who have been in classrooms across the city for many years," Mayor Menino said. "Through this collaboration, the BPS will build on the medical residency model and create a program that is designed and run by the district itself. This program is the first of its kind in Boston and the state."

Strategic Grant Partners, a coalition of family foundations, helped design BTR and has awarded $2.2M for the start up and operational costs for the first two years. From September through June, Teacher Residents will work in the classroom of a Master Teacher four days each week and participate in a fifth day of coursework taught by a mix of Boston's most effective principals-headmasters, teachers, and instructional coaches; academics from local colleges and universities; and community leaders.

Teacher Residents will continue their coursework in the summers before and after their school-year residency.

Superintendent Payzant lauded the program as a way to recruit and retain long-term, highly qualified teachers for the city.

"Like other districts, we lose many of our new teachers in the first three years, and we can't afford to continue to do so," he said. "Once they have their own classroom, many struggle with how to put their learning into actual practice. This approach gives new teachers a full year's experience with students before having responsibility for a classroom. Concentrating such support at the start of their careers will produce new teachers who are exceptionally well prepared to teach - and to teach in Boston for many years."

SGP Managing Director Joanna Jacobson said that BTR is a natural fit for the foundation's mission. "SGP's mission is to be a catalyst for systemic change in education and family services," she said. "We seek to engage stakeholders in solving problems, and to come to agreement about scalable solutions. The Boston Public Schools and Boston Plan for Excellence have proven time and again that they can make reform happen, and we are eager to work with them as partners on this initiative."

According to Richard Elmore, BPE trustee and professor at Harvard Graduate School of Education, the initiative is the next logical step for the Boston Plan for Excellence. "I am delighted that the Boston Plan for Excellence is undertaking this new venture in the preparation of teachers with the Boston Public Schools and Strategic Grant Partners," he said. "I have long held that the best way to prepare new teachers is to combine rigorous, research-based professional education with direct experience in classrooms under the supervision of competent, experienced teachers. This program provides an alternative model of teacher preparation that brings aspiring teachers into an environment of high-level practice for a full school year. The Boston Plan's concept offers a challenge to all existing teacher preparation programs to focus on the fundamentals of teacher preparation."

In August 2003, BTR will welcome its 16 first Teacher Residents, who are expected to come from traditional and nontraditional areas and reflect the diversity of Boston.

Teacher Residents will also have the opportunity to work toward a master's degree. UMass-Boston is the first institution of higher education to agree to award a master's degree to Teacher Residents who complete the program.

Each year, BTR will expand and by SY2008-2009 will prepare 120 teachers, about one third of the incoming teachers the district hires each year. Based at the Boston Plan, BTR will be directed by (Mr.) Jesse Solomon, a former teacher in Boston and Cambridge who piloted the concept of a teacher residency while at City on a Hill charter school. For more information, e-mail btr@bpe.org.

Read more on the program's Fact Sheet.