- Year 2019
- NSF Noyce Award # 1849948
- First Name Jeremy
- Last Name Zelkowski
- Discipline Math
- Co-PI(s)
Jim Gleason, The University of Alabama, jgleason@ua.edu; Martha Makowski, The University of Alabama, mbmakowski@ua.edu; Philip Westbrook, The University of Alabama, ptwestbrook@ua.edu
- Presenters
Jeremy Zelkowski, The University of Alabama, jzelkowski@ua.edu; Tye G Campbell, The University of Alabama, tgcampbell1@ua.edu
Need
Our project partnership spans a 50-mile radius from the UA campus consisting of approximately 30,000 students, of which approximately 35% are racial and ethnic minorities, and more than 55% qualify for the free and reduced lunch program. Further, we have a lack of strong mentor teachers for teacher candidates in our campus teacher preparation program. Lastly, we have some teacher turn-over from retirements, relocation, and leaving the profession in which we lose about 50% of our mentor teachers over a 6-7 year period. In our project, we will select 24 teachers into a Master Teaching Fellowship to become mathematics teacher leaders. Both inservice and preservice teachers will be mentored by MTFs which will influence the local STEM pipeline by improving student engagement in the mathematics classroom. We will study with research questions to determine the effectiveness and effect sizes of our project and program design on many varying aspects of teaching related to our five goals.
Goals
Research & Evaluation Questions RQ1: How does student engagement in mathematical practices change as teachers develop into MTFs’ RQ2: How does the ability of teachers to facilitate learning change as they develop into MTFs’ RQ3: How do teachers facilitate growth in preservice mathematics teachers’ development as MTFs develop into teacher leaders? RQ4: How does the participation of administrators impact mathematics education in their schools? EQ1: How effective have each of the project’s major activities been in terms of their contributions to achievement of the project’s purpose and goals? EQ2: What aspects of the project went well? What unanticipated challenges arose and how were they addressed? EQ3: How has this project affected the relationships between and among the project’s stakeholders, and especially their capacity for collaboration? EQ4: What has been learned regarding the implementation of teacher leadership programs? EQ5: What aspects of this project should be sustained beyond its funding period and what strategies for sustainability have been identified?
Approach
We will measure the teacher leaders’ progression throughout our project through a variety of instruments which measure teacher practices, beliefs, efficacy, student engagement, and reflective statements from teacher candidates. These measures include Gleason, Livers, & Zelkowski (2017) validated MCOP2 instrument, Wilkerson et al’s (2019) ATSEI, the MTEBI, three measures of quantitative thinking (GRE, NPBCT content assessment, and Praxis II), and our external evaluator’s qualitative measures. We utilize the framework of Tatto (1998), Darling-Hammond (2006), & NCSM (2008) integrated in a manner that respectively, fueled our program design, partnerships, and professional development model. TBy collecting multiple measures longitudinally, we intend to detect effect sizes of varying program components at different points of time.
Outcomes
We have four key deliverables. (1) The development of an empirically driven Mathematics Teacher Leader Specialist program based upon what we learn with our research and evaluation components of the project. (2) A mentorship model for teacher candidates by cooperating teachers that is produced and tested in PDSA (Plan Do Study Act) cycles by MTFs in the project. (3) An teacher induction program for high-needs schools developed by MTFs in the project. (4) Research findings for dissemination for the next 5-10 years. Our project began June 3, 2019 with the first cohort of non-Master’s degree teachers and June 1, 2020 will add the remaining MTFs. Summer 2019 and summer 2020 are anticipated poster presentations with summer 2021 and 2022 reporting on our administrator summits. 2023 and 2024 likely will be major findings and workshops at Noyce summer conferences.
Broader Impacts
To impact the region and nation, the PIs and MTFs will disseminate experiences, results, and future plans at professional conferences. First, annually, MTFs will begin presenting sessions for mathematics teachers at the ACTM annual fall forum conference to demonstrate early leadership. This event hosts on average 450-500 K-12 mathematics teachers from around the state. MTFs will pair or individually submit sessions for the conference beginning in the Year 2 of the project. Second, MTFs and the PI-Team will co-lead sessions at an NCTM regional or national conference. Third, MTFs will submit proposals to lead sessions at the annual Teachers Teaching with Technology (T3) conference. Fourth, the PI-Team will submit to present at the annual conferences of the AMTE, the NCTM (research conference), and the NCSM, including 1-2 MTFs per presentation. Finally, publications in both practitioner and research journals will be targeted.
