CONNECTICUT GENERAL ASSEMBLY

LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM REVIEW AND INVESTIGATIONS COMMITTEE

The Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee is a joint, bipartisan, statutory committee of the Connecticut General Assembly. It was established in 1972 to evaluate the efficiency, effectiveness, and statutory compliance of selected state agencies and programs, recommending remedies where needed. In 1975, the General Assembly expanded the committee's function to include investigations, and during the 1977 session added responsibility for "sunset" (automatic program termination) performance reviews. The committee was given authority to raise and report bills in 1985.

The program review committee is composed of 12 members. The president pro tempore of the Senate, the Senate minority leader, the speaker of the house, and the House minority leader each appoint three members.

2007-2008 Committee Members

Committee Staff

Carrie Vibert, Director

Catherine M. Conlin, Chief Analyst

Jill Jensen, Chief Analyst

Brian R. Beisel, Principal Analyst

Michelle Castillo, Principal Analyst

Maryellen Duffy, Principal Analyst

Miriam P. Kluger, Principal Analyst

Anne E. McAloon, Principal Analyst

Scott M. Simoneau, Principal Analyst

Michelle Riordan, Legislative Analyst II

Janelle Sagness, Legislative Analyst II

Bonnine T. Labbadia, Executive Secretary

Project Staff

Brian Beisel

Janelle Sagness

Legislative Program Review

& Investigations Committee

Beginning Educator Support

and Training Program

December 2007

Table of Contents

BEGINNING EDUCATOR SUPPORT AND TRAINING (BEST) PROGRAM

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

INTRODUCTION 1

Study Focus 2

Methodology 3

Report Content 3

I. BACKGROUND 5

Rationale for Teacher Induction Programs 5

Teacher Induction in Connecticut 6

Original BEST Program 7

Revised BEST Program 10

Common Core of Teaching 12

Overview of Current BEST Requirements 13

General Program Data 16

II. ORGANIZATION AND RESOURCES 17

Program Organization 17

Budget 19

III. TEACHER PREPARATION 23

Accreditation 24

Integration of State Standards and BEST 24

Portfolio Performance of Graduates 26

IV. SUPPORT 29

DESCRIPTION

Mentors 29

District Facilitators 39

Master Mentors 42

Lead Mentors 44

District/School Orientation 44

State Department of Education 45

Regional Educational Service Centers 48

Individual Assistance 52

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Rationale for Strong Support Programs 52

Overview of BEST Support Provided 55

Oversight of Mentoring 58

Substance of Mentoring 59

Time for Mentoring 62

Frequency of Mentoring 65

Length of Mentoring 66

Selection and Supply of Mentors 66

Training for Mentors 68

Mentor-Beginning Teacher Matches 69

District Facilitators 70

Administrators 72

V. ASSESSMENT 75

DESCRIPTION

Portfolio Contents 75

Timelines for Submitting a Portfolio 77

Scorers 79

Scoring Logistics and Site Organization 82

Scoring System 85

Portfolio Resources for Beginning Teachers 91

Portfolio Data Analysis 92

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Overview of BEST Assessment 96

Assessment Effectiveness 97

Portfolio Validity and Reliability 98

Alternative Assessment Models 100

Timing of Portfolio 107

Content 109

Video 110

Scoring Scale 112

Timeliness of Results 113

Feedback 113

Administrative Appeal Process 115

Residual Effects 115

Additional Portfolio Analysis 115

VI. APPENDICES

B. Connecticut's Common Core of Teaching Foundational Standards B-1

C. Additional Certification Description C-1

D. BEST Advisory Committee Recommendations D-1

E. RESC Map E-1

F. Mentor Stipends F-1

G. District Reference Groups G-1

H. Social Studies Portfolio Rubric H-1

I. Portfolio Scoring Reliability I-1

J. Licensure Assessments in Other States J-1

K. SDE Response to Public Hearing K-1

L. Sample Portfolio Feedback Report for a Failing Portfolio L-1

M. Regression Analysis Methodology M-1

N. Agency Response to Report N-1

Executive Summary

Beginning Educator Support and Training Program

The Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee authorized a study of Connecticut's Beginning Educator Support and Training (BEST) program in April 2007. The study focused on the effectiveness of BEST in achieving its intended objectives of supporting beginning teachers in Connecticut and assessing their overall skills and qualifications. The program's overall purpose is to ensure public school students in Connecticut are taught by teachers who have been determined competent in accordance with the teaching standards approved by the State Board of Education (SBOE). For this reason, the BEST program is most appropriately viewed as one component of Connecticut's educator continuum structured to ensure teacher effectiveness. Findings and recommendations accordingly were made in several areas, including proposals to ensure the state's teacher preparation programs instruct future teachers in how to teach according to the state standards and BEST, to improve support provided to beginning teachers, and to make the assessment more effective.

The program review committee believes that if the state expects its teachers to teach according to the principles contained in Connecticut's teaching standards and measured through the BEST assessment, three critical components must be coordinated. First, prospective teachers in Connecticut need to be instructed in the state's teaching standards and the BEST program starting during their teacher preparation. Second, the BEST program – in both its support and assessment components – must ensure teachers learn and use effective teaching practices as embedded in the state standards. Third, teachers must be held to those same standards for the rest of their careers in Connecticut. Although entire the educator continuum was not part of the original focus of this study, there is agreement among State Department of Education (SDE) personnel, program staff, administrators, and teachers' union representatives that more than just the BEST program must be strengthened if Connecticut expects its teachers to fully learn and consistently implement the state's teaching standards.

Background and Resources

The Beginning Educator Support and Training program was developed as the state's teacher induction program during the late 1980s by the State Department of Education in conjunction with input from educators throughout the state. Changes to the program's support and assessment components have been made over the past two decades, although the program's goals have remained the same. Most notably, the BEST assessment method changed to the current portfolio¹ in the late 1990s, concurrently with the adoption of new state teaching standards that emphasized the importance of student learning. For the 2006-07 school year, a total of 42,843 certified teachers provided instruction in Connecticut public schools with just over 4,900 beginning teachers participating in the BEST program in some capacity.

The financial resources available to BEST declined sharply in the early 1990s. The program's budget currently is about $4 million. BEST is administered by SDE with contracted assistance from the six Regional Educational Service Centers (RESCs) around the state and a firm specializing in occupational assessments. Overall, the committee found SDE has focused mainly on the assessment component of BEST, to the detriment of the support component.

Teacher Preparation Programs

Future teachers in Connecticut receive their first instruction in how to teach (i.e., pedagogy), as well as their first teaching experiences, during their teacher preparation. The state's 20 teacher preparation programs are required by regulation to teach their teacher candidates according to BEST and the state's teaching standards. The committee found, however, it is unclear to what extent the programs' curricula are aligned with BEST or the standards. Further, an analysis of BEST assessment data revealed few significant differences among the rates at which teacher preparation programs graduates fail the BEST assessment.

Support

All educators new to teaching in Connecticut must receive BEST support. Support is given mainly by designated mentors, with a range of supplemental support provided by other teachers and administrators at beginning teachers' schools and districts, SDE, and the RESCs.

The committee found the area of BEST in most need of attention is the level and quality of support for beginning teachers. A key goal of the support component of BEST is to familiarize beginning teachers with Connecticut's teaching standards, which are the foundation of the BEST assessment and describe how all the state's teachers are supposed to be teaching. For a large portion of beginning teachers in Connecticut who responded to the committee staff's survey, however, this level of meaningful support is not reached.

The committee recommended changes be made to ensure beginning teachers receive proper support through BEST during their initial years of teaching in the state. The goal of the recommendations is to ensure all beginning teachers receive substantive mentoring from trained mentors with relevant expertise. Improved support will better prepare beginning teachers for the BEST assessment and for teaching according to the state's teaching standards. In addition, national research indicates strengthened support may lead to other positive results, including lower costs to school districts due to reduced teacher turnover and positive gains in student achievement resulting from more effective teaching. With the committee's recommendations, the BEST support component should provide beginning teachers with more consistent and substantive support that builds up to the BEST assessment.

Assessment

By the end of their second year, approximately 90 percent of beginning teachers must complete the BEST assessment, which currently is a portfolio.² The committee study determined the portfolio – as an assessment method – is a valid and reliable instrument. The portfolio assessment generally meets the program's key goal of ensuring all beginning teachers are at or above the minimum level of competency as measured against the state's standards within the Common Core of Teaching. There is a low percentage – usually ten percent annually – of beginning teachers who do not pass their portfolio assessments on the first attempt, and only one to two percent ultimately fail after three attempts. It stands to reason that the higher the pass rate, the stronger the indication that teachers meet at least the minimum standards for effective teaching established in Connecticut.

At the same time, the committee determined several changes to the BEST portfolio assessment would make it a more meaningful process from which beginning teachers will learn. Generally, the recommendations focus on making the portfolio process less arduous for beginning teachers, while maintaining the state's goal of making sure beginning teachers meet specific teaching standards.

Changes to the BEST assessment – in conjunction with those made in the teacher preparation and BEST support areas – are designed to make the current BEST process a more useful and relevant experience that fully captures what beginning teachers have learned about effective teaching in their teacher preparation, through classroom experiences, and from their mentors during the initial years of teaching in Connecticut. Taken together, the committee's recommendations have the ability to positively impact and advance the knowledge and skills of Connecticut's beginning teachers.

Recommendations

The Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee adopted the following recommendations.

Introduction

Over the years, Connecticut has modified its teacher certification requirements to increase the overall quality of teachers. In 1986, the state adopted an extensive education law that included a teacher certification overhaul. Known as the Education Enhancement Act (EEA), the law was a direct response by the state to address Connecticut's growing problem of recruiting and retaining qualified teachers.

A key component of the act provided the means for local school districts to increase teacher salaries, which was seen as a way of attracting teachers to the profession and keeping teachers in Connecticut. At the same time, the EEA strengthened the standards for teachers in several ways. Chief among those increased standards was the establishment of a three-tiered teacher certification system that codified new requirements for beginning, experienced, and veteran teachers. State certification for a beginning teacher, called initial certification, required public school teachers starting their careers in either the profession or the state to participate in a state-run teacher induction program providing support and assessment.

The teacher induction program developed at that time by the State Department of Education (SDE), in conjunction with input from educators throughout the state, was the Beginning Educator Support and Training (BEST) program. The program provides a combination of support for and assessment of teachers who are at the start of their teaching careers in Connecticut.³ In the first year, beginning teachers in BEST receive support, centered on mentoring. In the second year, they complete a formal skills assessment, in a portfolio format, to ensure they meet specific standards regarding effective teaching practices, which are set by the State Board of Education. Those teachers who fail the portfolio are allowed to re-submit at least one additional portfolio in their third year.

Although changes to the program's support and assessment components have been made over the past two decades, the overall purpose of BEST has remained the same since its origination: to ensure public school students in Connecticut are taught by teachers who have been determined competent in accordance with the teaching standards approved by the State Board of Education (SBOE). At the same time, the department has promoted the BEST program as a process from which beginning teachers learn about effective teaching practices contained in the state standards and strengthen their overall teaching skills, with the goal of having teachers teach according to the state standards throughout their careers. Consistent with this approach, the BEST program is most appropriately viewed as one component of Connecticut's educator continuum structured to ensure teacher effectiveness. Although the program is supposed to familiarize new teachers with and assess them on their knowledge and application of the state's teaching standards, BEST should be neither the teachers' first introduction to those standards nor their last experience with them, as recognized by SDE.

Study Focus

Understanding the ability to recruit and retain qualified, competent teachers in Connecticut is a vital element of the state's public education system, and the potential impact the state's teacher certification requirements have on school district capacity to meet those objectives, the Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee decided in April 2007 to examine teacher certification in two phases. This study was approved by the committee as Phase One of a two-part review of the state's teacher certification system. Phase Two of the study, as determined in more detail by the committee, is intended to examine Connecticut's teacher certification system more broadly, including its relative impact on the state's ability to recruit and retain qualified teachers, to the extent such impact can be identified.

This review of the BEST program focuses on the program's effectiveness in achieving its intended objectives of supporting beginning teachers in Connecticut and assessing their overall teaching skills and knowledge. Some areas identified for review by the committee include: examining the role of SDE and local school districts in the operation and oversight of the program; describing the process used to recruit, train, and oversee the various resource personnel associated with the program at the state and local school district levels; and assessing program activities and results to determine if the program is meeting its intended objectives.

Answering the question of whether the BEST process – in particular the portfolio, because it is intended to be a culmination of what is learned through teacher preparation and support provided through the program – is effective, is difficult and depends on which measures are used for evaluation. For example, do the standards continue to be appropriate for beginning teachers? Second, are teachers receiving a consistent level of quality support? Third, is the assessment method to evaluate beginning teachers based on the state standards appropriate and reliable? Fourth, even if the assessment method is appropriate and reliable, is it necessarily the most effective way to assess beginning teachers' knowledge, skills, and competencies? And fifth, is there a more effective way to assess beginning teachers that would improve their understanding of the state's teaching standards and ability to implement them? The committee addresses these questions in this report. A key question that remains, however, is whether the state is prepared to adopt the necessary policies and devote adequate resources to ensure the state's teacher induction program receives the support needed to fulfill its goals.

Advocates of BEST believe it is properly designed for supporting and assessing beginning teachers. Through the program, beginning teachers are provided support at the local school district level and via state efforts. At the same time, the teachers are properly evaluated through an assessment proven valid and reliable to ensure they meet minimum competency standards set by the state. Opponents, however, maintain the assessment process is overly onerous for teachers generally beginning their careers. They also question the overall efficacy of the evaluation instrument used in Connecticut to assess beginning teachers. Despite disagreement over the assessment, most advocates and critics concur that BEST gives insufficient support at varying levels to beginning teachers.

During the course of this study, including testimony received as part of the committee's public hearing on this topic, numerous, and often conflicting, ideas were offered about how to improve BEST. The committee gave careful consideration to the comments, concerns, and ideas expressed through interviews, surveys, and testimony received as this set of findings and recommendations was developed. The committee's recommendations attempt to balance the state's efforts to ensure beginning teachers meet a specific level of standards for teaching by addressing areas of the current support and assessment processes in need of improvement.

Methodology

A variety of information sources was used for this report. Extensive interviews of various constituencies associated with the BEST program were conducted, including staff from the State Department of Education, representatives from the state's two teachers' unions, BEST representatives from each of the six Regional Educational Service Centers in the state, education faculty from the University of Connecticut, representatives from the Department of Higher Education's Alternate Route to Certification (ARC) program, and staff from the association representing boards of education in the state. Committee staff also attended multiple BEST training sessions and seminars for mentors, assessment scorers, administrators, and beginning teachers, at which conversations with members of each of these groups were held. An extensive literature search was conducted, and information about induction and assessment programs in other states was collected.

Key sources of information for this report were the results of three surveys conducted by the committee. All teachers who completed their first year of teaching in Connecticut during the 2006-07 school year were surveyed to receive their input regarding the support they received as part of BEST. Surveys also were sent to all teachers who completed their second year of teaching in the state during the 2006-07 school year and submitted BEST portfolios in May 2007 in order to receive their feedback regarding the portfolio process. In the final analysis, the responses for both surveys had very similar distributions of teachers according to District Reference Groups⁴ (DRGs), and for the Year Two teacher survey, portfolio scores to the overall populations of teachers. All BEST district facilitators were surveyed electronically to collect information about local school district practices and policies regarding beginning teachers. A full description of the survey methodologies and copies of the surveys sent to teachers are included in Appendix A.

Report Content

This report is organized into five chapters. Chapter One provides background on the origins and components of BEST. Chapter Two describes the program's organization and resources. Chapter Three gives an overview of BEST in relation to teacher preparation programs in Connecticut and provides recommendations to ensure the programs are aligned with BEST and the state teaching standards. Chapter Four discusses the support component of the BEST program and gives recommendations to improve the quality of support. Chapter Five details the program's assessment component and provides recommendations for improving the assessment process to make it more effective. The appendices are: A) Surveys of Beginning Teachers and District Facilitators, B) Common Core of Teaching Foundational Standards, C) Additional Certification Description, D) BEST Advisory Committee Recommendations, E) Regional Educational Service Centers Map, F) Mentor Stipends, G) District Reference Groups, H) Social Studies Portfolio Rubric, I) Portfolio Scoring Reliability, J) Licensure Assessments in Other States, K) SDE Response to Public Hearing, L) Sample Portfolio Feedback Report for a Failing Portfolio, and M) Regression Analysis Methodology.

It is the policy of the Legislative Program Review and Investigations Committee to provide agencies subject to a study with an opportunity to review and comment on the recommendations prior to publication of the final report. Appendix N contains the response from the State Department of Education.

Chapter One: Background

Rationale for Teacher Induction Programs

As with the start of any type of professional career, beginning teachers are faced with numerous demands. Novice teachers are concerned not only with the classes and students they will teach, but also with understanding the culture of their new schools and school districts. Learning the basic logistics of their schools can be challenging for new teachers as well.

One way to ease the transition for beginning teachers is through their participation in teacher induction programs. Such programs are intended to provide new teachers with the assistance and guidance necessary to successfully introduce them to their new careers. This support generally is delivered by assigning more experienced teachers as mentors to beginning teachers, conducting formal orientation programs, and having beginning teachers participate in formal professional development. Teacher induction programs commonly focus on some combination of the following topics:

Many view quality teacher induction programs as a way to recruit and retain teachers. If a school district recognizes, addresses, and supports the needs of beginning teachers during their first years of teaching, particularly through quality induction programs, prospective teachers may be more apt to work for such a district. At the same time, as indicated below, attrition rates for beginning teachers who participate in teacher induction programs are lower than the rates for those teachers who do not participate. Therefore, teacher induction programs can boost teacher retention. The most recent national data from the federal Department of Education indicate a majority of all public school teachers with up to five years' experience participated in a formal induction program for new teachers; approximately 60 percent did during the 1999-00 school year (SY).⁵ As highlighted in Figure I-1, the percent of teachers participating in teacher induction programs varies by district geographical location. The figure shows 58 percent of teachers in “urban” districts participated in teacher induction programs, as did 63 percent of teachers in “urban fringe/large town” districts, and 54 percent of teachers in “rural/small town” districts. The national data also indicate 47 percent of beginning teachers in public schools worked with a mentor in the same content area during the school year. Having novice teachers work with experienced mentors, particularly in the same content area, is seen by many as an important way to support new teachers as they start their teaching careers.

The national literature provides evidence that teacher induction programs are an important factor in retaining new teachers. For example, as highlighted in Figure I-2, data from a survey by the National Center for Education Statistics show for school year 1999-00, attrition rates for first-year teachers were lower when teachers received support through a formal induction or mentoring program.The overall effect new teacher induction programs have on student learning, however, is more difficult to measure. While national data in this area are limited, studies on this topic are emerging and promising.⁶ Understanding the need to more fully evaluate the impact teacher induction programs have on student achievement, the federal Department of Education has recently contracted with a private research company to conduct a national study of new teacher induction programs and their relative influence on student achievement, improvements in teacher instructional practices, and teacher retention.⁷

Teacher Induction in Connecticut

A statewide induction program for new teachers, BEST, has been in place in Connecticut since 1989. BEST is part of a larger, standards-based certification continuum established for most teachers in the state. The standards in place are designed to ensure teacher quality throughout the various stages of a teacher's career, from when a student decides to enter a formal teacher preparation program at a Connecticut college or university through the highest level of state certification for veteran teachers. BEST is the program within the continuum that supports and assesses teachers beginning their careers in Connecticut to ensure they meet minimum state standards necessary to continue their state teacher certifications. For school year 2006-07, the number of certified teachers in Connecticut providing student instruction totaled 42,843. Of those, 4,913 (11 percent) participated in the BEST program, which accounted for approximately 90 percent of all new teachers in the state.

BEST comprises two components: support and assessment. As detailed more in Chapter Four, support of beginning teachers required through BEST augments district orientation for new teachers. School districts are not required by law to formally conduct an orientation for teachers, but SDE estimates most, if not all, districts across the state have some form of program to acclimate new teachers to their districts. No data on district programs are formally tracked at the state level.

The assessment component of BEST, as discussed in Chapter Five, was developed as the vehicle to ensure beginning teachers meet minimum competency standards approved by the State Board of Education. Beginning teachers are evaluated as part of a state-administered assessment process within BEST. The actual instrument used to assess new teachers has changed over time, as discussed below.

Original BEST Program

Recommendations from several study groups in the early to mid-1980s helped lead to passage of the Education Enhancement Act in 1986. The act was an extensive initiative to address Connecticut's teacher shortage through attracting and retaining qualified teachers in the state's public schools. The key components of the law were a substantial increase in teacher salaries and the establishment of more rigorous standards to ensure the overall quality of teachers.

Chief among the EEA's increased standards for teachers was the creation of the Beginning Educator Support and Training program. BEST was developed to provide a statewide structure for uniform support and assistance for beginning teachers, primarily through mentoring and training. At the same time, the program established a new statewide system to assess beginning teachers' abilities in the classroom. Under the new system, only upon successful completion of the program could a beginning teacher attain the proper state certification to continue teaching in the state's public schools. Before BEST, there was no state evaluation of beginning teachers for certification purposes.

Support. BEST was implemented in 1989, and originally was a one-year commitment on the part of new teachers. A second year in the program was an option for teachers who did not satisfactorily complete the program's assessment component. School districts were, and are still, required by law to support beginning teachers during their first year as they transitioned to their new careers.

The core of the support provided through local school districts was the use of trained mentors. Mentors were experienced teachers within school districts recognized for their ability in the classroom. Groups of staff within each district – known as district committees – were responsible for selecting mentors. State law required that mentors: 1) be Connecticut-certified teachers; 2) have two years of satisfactory teaching experience within their current school; and 3) have an understanding of the state's teaching competencies, as discussed below. ⁸

The use of mentors at the inception of BEST was, and continues to be, the primary means of the program's support component for beginning teachers. Mentor duties and responsibilities were extensive, but mainly included: ⁹

BEST further required school districts to meet additional obligations for supporting beginning teachers. For example, districts were to provide “release time” from classroom duties for mentors and beginning teachers to meet during the school year. By regulation, no fewer than four school days, consisting of at least eight meetings, were required for planning, demonstration, observation, and feedback on teaching between the mentor and new teacher. The release time requirement for alternate route beginning teachers was a minimum of five school days and 10 meetings. As noted in Chapter Four, currently there are different interpretations of the release time requirement.

State law originally provided for compensation for mentors. The initial rate was $1,000 for each mentor who worked with a beginning teacher for a school year. The program also required mentors to submit activity logs to SDE. The logs served as the department's way to oversee the mentor support component of the program and hold mentors accountable for their work with beginning teachers. Mentors received their compensation only if their logs were submitted.

In FY 92, funding for mentor compensation shifted, from a state obligation to a district's discretion. Each public school district now decides whether and at what level to compensate mentors. Moreover, mentors are no longer required to submit any type of activity report to the education department. The department attributes this to several factors, including the elimination of state funding for mentor stipends in the early 1990s and limited BEST staff resources to receive and review any type of mentor reports. As a result, mentor accountability is now a function of local school districts.

Training for new mentors was a state function required under the original BEST program. A “refresher” training program for mentors who had not mentored a beginning teacher for three or more years also was required by the original program, although this obligation no longer exists. Over time, new training sessions for district personnel (e.g., administrators) have been implemented.

Assessment. The assessment component of BEST fulfills the 1986 legislative mandate that beginning teachers be required to achieve a satisfactory evaluation on a “professional knowledge clinical assessment” within one year of teaching in a public school.¹⁰ The BEST statute and regulations outline the specific assessment requirements. The way new teachers have been assessed, however, has changed over time.

Initially, the assessment of beginning teachers was based on structured classroom observations. A series of up to six classroom observations conducted by state-trained assessors over the course of the beginning teacher's first year was required. The classroom observations were conducted by two teacher assessors and two administrator assessors from outside the beginning teacher's district, and two state assessors, with each assessor responsible for one observation per teacher. The observations took place at various intervals throughout the first year and were scored by the assessors. A teacher needed to achieve a minimum score from the assessments on a rolling basis to maintain his or her state teaching certification. If the teacher did not achieve a passing final rating during his or her first year, the evaluation process would be repeated during the following school year.

The BEST assessment process required teachers to complete an assessment information form prior to each classroom observation. The form sought general descriptive information about the teacher's students and more specific information about the context and purpose of the lesson the assessor would observe. Assessors would review the completed form, and then meet with beginning teachers before the actual observation to discuss the information. After the pre-observation interview, the assessor would observe the beginning teacher give a lesson in the classroom (generally 45-60 minutes). The assessor used a standardized evaluation form to record, among other things, how the teacher engaged students, handled questions, and monitored his or her classroom. The assessor would then meet with the teacher once the evaluation was completed for a script-driven interview with cursory questions (e.g., did anything unusual happen during the class).

Following each classroom observation, the beginning teacher would receive a feedback report from the assessor outlining the teacher's strengths and areas needing attention. A composite report showing the combined, rolling scores of the independent observations also was sent to the teacher. Teachers achieving a satisfactory rating were eligible to continue their state certification; a second year of observations was available for all other teachers.

The actual tool used by assessors to evaluate teachers within the classroom observation structure was the Connecticut Competency Instrument (CCI). The CCI, unique to Connecticut, was created by a development team consisting of SDE staff, practitioners, and national researchers during the 1980s. The instrument was revised through a formal validation and testing process.

The Connecticut Competency Instrument was formulated from a set of 15 general teaching competencies originally adopted by the State Board of Education in 1984. Based on those competencies, called the Connecticut Teaching Competencies, the assessment tool/evaluation form used for the classroom observations was organized into 10 “dimensions of effective teaching behaviors.” These were grouped into three categories that mirrored what were then considered to be the major components of the instructional process: 1) classroom management; 2) instruction; and 3) assessment of student understanding.

According to SDE, the on-site classroom observation process and the Connecticut Competency Instrument had several problems. These included:

Revised BEST Program

In 1993, the BEST Blue Ribbon Panel was established to examine changing the BEST program, in part because of:

The blue ribbon panel consisted of 27 members representing various constituencies, including teachers' unions, local school districts, higher education, and education associations. The purpose of the panel was twofold: 1) assist the state education department in redesigning the BEST program to meet the needs of Connecticut's students in the 1990s; and 2) suggest alternatives to the current systems of accountability and professional development for both novice and experienced teachers.¹²

Prior to the creation of the BEST panel, SDE was interested in a way to measure general and content-specific pedagogy of beginning teachers, but no assessment of that type had been developed. The department worked with the Teacher Assessment Project of Stanford University on developing new performance evaluations, including a portfolio-based assessment. SDE believed the assessment needed to integrate three types of knowledge: 1) content; 2) general pedagogical; and 3) students as learners. The department's eventual goal was to create and implement this type of assessment as part of the BEST program.

Based on SDE's work developing an integrated assessment tool for beginning teachers, the department's collaboration with outside consultants, including the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards,¹³ and the endorsement of the BEST Blue Ribbon Panel, a second generation of the BEST program was initiated. The main change to the program was the development of a portfolio-based evaluation tool for new teachers.

Portfolio-based evaluation. In 1995, SDE began pilot-testing a content-specific assessment process based on a portfolio (i.e., a structured written document and video developed by the beginning teacher around a unit of classroom instruction). The portfolio instrument was developed in accordance with standards for educational and psychological testing developed by the Joint Commission of the American Educational Research Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Council on Measurement in Education. SDE also worked with the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC), which is part of the Council of Chief State School Officials, on developing a prototype for the mathematics content area.

The portfolio was systematically tested by SDE for its reliability and validity as a formal measurement tool for beginning teachers, including review and consultation from Professional Evaluation Services and the Educational Testing Service. SDE also involved various constituencies within Connecticut in developing the portfolio, including teachers, administrators, and higher education faculty. ¹⁴

The BEST program's new assessment process based on a content-specific portfolio format was implemented incrementally from 1999 to 2005, as indicated in Table I-1.¹⁵ Beginning teachers in the English language arts, mathematics, and science content areas were the first to complete and submit portfolios as their formal assessments under BEST for the 1999-00 school year. Over the next four years, portfolios for the remaining seven content areas were researched, developed, tested, and implemented. World languages, the last of the 10 content areas to transition to the portfolio format, was added in the 2004-05 school year.

Common Core of Teaching

At the same time the new portfolio assessment instrument was being developed, SDE was working on a revised set of competency standards for teachers. The Common Core of Teaching (CCT) was ultimately adopted by the State Board of Education in 1999 replacing the previous CTC discussed earlier. The CCT articulates the expectations and understandings teachers must have about their professional knowledge and practice (i.e., pedagogy), students, and evaluation of student learning. As with the development of the portfolio, the department involved various constituencies in establishing the teaching standards.

The Common Core of Teaching includes foundational skills and competencies that are common to all teachers from pre-K through Grade 12. The CCT also includes discipline-specific professional standards that represent knowledge, skills, and competencies unique for teachers in the 10 content areas that require portfolio assessments. (Appendix B provides the foundational standards of the Common Core of Teaching.)

The Common Core of Teaching, which was based on the national research current in 1999, represented a shift in how effective teaching was viewed. Moreover, the relevant competencies previously assessed through the Connecticut Competency Instrument were integrated into the standards used in the Common Core of Teaching.

It is important to note that the Common Core of Teaching standards extend beyond BEST, although the BEST teaching portfolio has been designed to assess the foundational skills and the discipline-specific standards contained in the CCT. The CCT incorporates the full continuum of standards-based teaching in Connecticut, and also serves as the foundation for the: 1) state's definition of effective teaching; and 2) guidelines for teacher evaluation, professional development, and the issuance of continuing education units.

Overview of Current BEST Requirements

Connecticut has three levels of teacher certification, as outlined in Table I-2. The table shows the type of state teaching certificate, the duration of the certificate, and the requirements either to advance to the next-level certificate upon expiration of a teacher's current certificate or to maintain the professional educator certificate, which is the state's highest level teacher certificate. Additional descriptions of the Durational Shortage Area Permit and the state's Alternate Route to Certification program are provided in Appendix C.

Beginning teachers must complete the BEST program to obtain their provisional educator certification, currently the second level of the state's three-tiered teacher certification structure. A beginning teacher in the following categories is required to participate in the BEST program:

Table I-3 highlights the support and assessment requirements for beginning teachers in their first through third years in the BEST program. For most individuals, participation in the program is a two-year process. During their first year, all beginning teachers required to participate in BEST are to receive support from either a state-trained mentor or mentor team, regardless of the subject they teach. As the table also shows, the formal assessment of beginning teachers typically occurs in their second year in the program. A third year is an option, if necessary, for those who fail to submit a satisfactory portfolio or who are granted a deferral.

Although the vast majority of beginning teachers in Connecticut are required to participate in both the support and assessment components of BEST, there are some exceptions. Table I-4 shows which teachers, based on their state teacher certification codes, are included in the support and assessment category, the support only category, or those for whom the BEST program does not apply.

Beginning teachers are automatically enrolled in the BEST program by their school districts. Districts are responsible for informing SDE of all beginning teachers hired each year. Based on the registration information, the beginning teacher is provided with the necessary BEST program materials. Among other information, beginning teachers receive a BEST program guide CD-ROM, which describes the program and details what is required of beginning teachers. The information for beginning teachers is also available online through the SDE and BEST websites. Beginning teachers registered into BEST after December 31 of a given school year are considered late registrants and will start their participation in BEST the following school year.

BEST Advisory Committee. A recent development regarding the BEST program was the creation of a BEST Advisory Committee by SDE in late 2005. The committee was part of a larger committee process convened by the department to examine Connecticut's educator continuum from a macro-perspective. Similar to the BEST Blue Ribbon Panel of 1993, the BEST Advisory Committee was to examine the program and recommend improvements.

Advisory committee members were chosen by SDE. The members represented various constituencies, including teachers' unions, educators, beginning teachers, administrators, associations, and private business. Committee membership totaled 31, and the group was facilitated by an outside consulting firm.

The advisory committee met on several occasions and used various methods to collect information. The group was divided into smaller subgroups to discuss various topics, including the BEST program. The state's two teachers' unions also held three sessions to collect feedback from beginning teachers about BEST. This information was then synthesized for the committee. Ultimately, the advisory committee prepared a draft report in June 2006 outlining various recommendations for improving BEST. (Appendix D includes the committee's recommendations.)

The process for developing the final report, however, was met with dissent from several of the committee members. Although not part of the advisory committee's final report, some members voiced their concerns in writing. Specifically, objections were made to the recommendation to develop a new assessment system to replace the current portfolio. There were also questions about the overall objectivity, validity, and representativeness of the data collected and used in the committee's process. The advisory committee's report was never formally adopted by SDE or presented to the State Board of Education; technically it remains in draft form at present.

General Program Data

During the 2006-07 school year:

Chapter Two: Organization and Resources

The State Department of Education administers and oversees the Beginning Educator Support and Training program. Organizations at the regional and local levels also play critical roles in implementing the program's support and assessment components. An outside contractor is used to maintain and analyze BEST program data and to assist with general program operations.

Funding for state and regional activities of BEST comes from two specific line item appropriations within the state's General Fund. As discussed in this chapter, the program's allocation and expenditures dropped sharply when the state experienced budget difficulties in 1992. BEST expenditures have remained relatively flat, without adjusting for inflation, since that time. The funding decline led to lower program staffing levels at SDE and the six Regional Educational Service Centers (RESCs), which play a key role in implementing the support component of BEST. RESCs are regional organizations that provide a variety of training, technical assistance, and other support to school districts in their regions. (A map of the municipalities served by each RESC is provided in Appendix E.)

Program Organization

Generally, SDE provides broad program oversight and handles the assessment component of the BEST program. Regional Educational Service Centers serve the lead role in offering support to district- and school-level personnel, with the EastConn RESC functioning as the central administrative RESC for the program. Individual school districts provide direct support to beginning teachers at the local level.

State Department of Education. SDE staff coordinates BEST program activities and policies, leads the assessment efforts, and oversees the support of beginning teachers in the program. The department staff for BEST, and their roles, include:

The SDE staff responsible for implementing and overseeing BEST consists of full-time department employees, including administrative support staff who assist where needed. Some staff, however, split their time between either multiple roles within BEST (e.g., between assessment consultant and project leader) or BEST duties and other projects (e.g., assessment/validation for BEST and for the school administrator examination).

Teachers-in-residence are not SDE employees, but local educators, administrators, and sometimes higher education employees. They are recommended by their local school districts or institutions of higher education and selected by SDE through an application process. SDE recruits educators to become teachers-in-residence due to their outstanding achievements as teachers and leaders at the local level. A total of ten TIRs are chosen each school year.

EastConn enters into a contract with a TIR's school district, which releases the teacher for three or four days a week to work within the BEST program. The fifth day generally is spent within the district in various capacities. TIRs remain school district employees while on loan to work for BEST. Districts, in turn, are reimbursed $40,000 per school year by EastConn, approximately the salary of a beginning teacher, to find a replacement for the TIR. While working for BEST, a few TIRs serve as the project leaders for the program's smaller content areas, such as music, world languages, and visual arts. Each content area must have either a designated department project leader or a TIR serving as the project leader.

The department's BEST staff levels for 1999 and 2007 are compared in Table II-1. SDE personnel information for prior years of the program is not available. The department notes staffing levels have decreased due to a decline in program funding. Since FY 1999, the earliest year for which data was available, the BEST professional staff level has dropped by nearly half, from approximately 16.5 to 9.1 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff.¹⁶

Regional Educational Service Centers. Each of the six RESCs has one field staff representative who works part-time on the support component of BEST. In addition, one representative coordinates regional support full-time, and another leads the creation and adjustment of standardized trainings on a part-time basis. Collectively, this eight-person group is referred to as the RESC or BEST “field staff” throughout this report. A ninth RESC staff member manages BEST data regarding mentoring and trainings. The state education department and RESC staff coordinate BEST activities through regular internal and inter-organizational meetings and via formal reports sent to the department.

The BEST field staff was substantially larger before the state funding cuts in the early 1990s. Originally, each RESC allocated two staff members, totaling between 1.0 and 1.7 FTE positions, to assessment and support activities, according to the current field staff. With the staffing decline, RESCs were no longer responsible for as much assessment work and shifted their focus to support. The field staff time currently devoted to BEST is one part-time position for each RESC, aside from the field staff coordinators.

The field staff coordinates with and receives guidance from the state education department through monthly meetings of a policy team. The policy team members are the SDE Education Manager who oversees BEST; the SDE BEST Program Coordinator; the EastConn Executive Director; and the EastConn BEST field staff member who is the program's lead trainer. The group reviews and adjusts program operations, policies, and procedures. In addition to the policy team meetings, the field staff and BEST program office communicate on an as-needed basis.

Under a contract with the state education department, EastConn funds the regional activities. The current three-year agreement totals nearly $10 million and expires August 2009. SDE has another contract with Professional Examination Services for data management services and data-related operations. The PES contract totals just over $1 million for a three-year term, also ending August 2009.

Local school districts. The state law governing BEST requires local school districts to provide mentoring and other support to beginning teachers participating in the BEST program. As described more fully in Chapter Four, each district is to designate a coordinator, called a district facilitator, to oversee BEST at the local level. Every district also is responsible for recruiting teachers to serve as mentors, either alone or in a team, and for choosing assessment scorers.

Districts receive no funding from the state to implement either the support or assessment component of BEST (aside from support trainings, which are funded by SDE). Some, however, choose to offer compensation from district monies to program facilitators, mentors, and scorers as highlighted in Chapters Four and Five.

Budget

The BEST program is funded through two separate program funds within SDE's budget: the Teacher Standards Implementation Program (TSIP) and the Basic Skills Exam Teachers in Training (BSETT) fund. All TSIP funds – and part of the BSETT funds – are spent on BEST operations, research, and staffing.¹⁷ BEST funding from both sources between FYs 1990 and 2007, unadjusted for inflation, is depicted in Figure II-1 below.

During the program's early years, funding increased until it peaked in FY 1991 at about $9.7 million. Funding was cut by more than two-thirds in the following fiscal year, which SDE attributes to poor state fiscal conditions. BEST program expenditures have remained at about the same level since then, and totaled approximately $4.0 million for FY 2007.

TSIP consistently has provided the majority financial support for BEST. Since the FY 1992, TSIP funding has ranged from nearly $3 million in that fiscal year to about $3.6 million in FY 1999. The BSETT category, which started partially funding BEST in FY 1996, has contributed as little as approximately $470,000 in FY 1998 to nearly $1 million in the most recent fiscal year. BSETT's portion reached $900,000 in FY 2002 and has since remained above that figure.

Figure II-2 illustrates that when TSIP and BSETT funding is adjusted for inflation, total BEST expenditures are at their lowest real levels since the program was fully implemented in 1989. The most current annual expenditure amount was just over one-quarter of the program's real funding peak, which was equivalent to $14.6 million in today's dollars. BEST's expenditures generally have been declining in real terms since FY 1999, after fluctuating throughout the 1990s.

Chapter Three: Teacher Preparation

The educator continuum begins with teacher preparation programs. The key purpose of the programs is to train prospective teachers and instruct them in how to become effective educators. In Connecticut, there are 20 teacher preparation programs. Sixteen of the programs are part of higher education institutions, while four are Alternate Route to Certification (ARC) programs. However, each category of programs contains variation. Higher education programs include: traditional programs that offer an education concentration during an undergraduate course of study; programs that require participants to attend an extra fifth year of study, often culminating in a master's degree in education; and programs that consist of a two-year master's degree in education. ARC programs are run by several different types of organizations: the state, a higher education institution, a Regional Educational Service Center, and Teach for America.¹⁸

All Connecticut teacher preparation programs must meet the following regulatory requirements:¹⁹

The programs are to demonstrate candidates know the state teaching and learning standards and can demonstrate the competencies contained therein. In addition, teacher candidates who have completed their course of study must meet or exceed the state's minimum Praxis II²¹ score to demonstrate content area competency. Beyond these requirements, the programs may design courses and other aspects as they wish. The requirements vary somewhat for the ARC programs, due to their condensed timeframe.

Upon successful completion of the requirements and acquisition of bachelor's degrees, the programs recommend the teacher candidates to SDE for the initial educator certificate. This certificate is the first tier of Connecticut's three-level certification system. The initial educator certificate allows the graduates to teach at any public school for up to three years. Upon receiving initial educator certificates and being hired to teach, beginning teachers must participate in BEST. Teachers may continue to the next certification tier only after successfully completing the BEST program, including passing a formal assessment, as discussed in Chapter One.

Accreditation

Only teacher preparation programs that have been accredited by the State Board of Education and the Department of Higher Education Board of Governors may recommend graduates for initial educator certification. In July 2003, the accreditation standards of the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), which is the professional accrediting body for teacher preparation programs, went into effect in Connecticut. Because of this step, Connecticut programs now may apply for either state-only accreditation or joint state-NCATE accreditation. NCATE accreditation involves an application fee and a more thorough review of the program, but is more prestigious than state accreditation. Five Connecticut programs currently hold joint state-NCATE accreditation: the University of Connecticut (UConn); Southern, Central, and Eastern Connecticut State Universities; and the University of Hartford.

Any new program must obtain accreditation before accepting any students. In addition, each existing program is evaluated every five years for continuing accreditation. Before the 2003 reforms, the continuing accreditation process occurred every seven years.

Integration of State Standards and BEST

Teacher preparation programs in Connecticut are where most of the state's new teachers are first instructed in the pedagogy of teaching, which is the art and/or science of being a teacher and the strategies or style of instruction. The programs also need to ensure their candidates have knowledge about the state standards as delineated in the Connecticut Common Core of Teaching and are starting to apply the teaching methods embedded in the CCT. As described earlier, the CCT outlines how teachers are expected to teach and the standards against which their performances will be judged when they complete the BEST assessment.

The State Board of Education recognized the importance of instructing teacher preparation participants in the state standards by requiring this through regulation.²² The preparation programs must demonstrate students know the CCT, the Connecticut Mastery Tests (CMTs), the Connecticut Academic Performance Test (CAPT), and the codes of professional responsibility for teachers and administrators. The programs also must ensure participants demonstrate the current Connecticut licensure competencies as defined through regulation (currently the BEST program's requirements) and the CCT. These requirements were adopted simultaneously with the move to adopt the NCATE standards for state accreditation purposes in the late 1990s (although the standards did not go into effect until 2003). Together, these changes signal the state's intention of linking the instruction of prospective teachers to state teaching standards.

Program compliance with the requirements to integrate the teaching standards and BEST program is checked during the program accreditation visits. A visiting team, which must include at least one representative each from higher education institutions, SDE, K-12 districts, the Department of Higher Education, and another state's education system, draws on the information provided by the institution and interviews to determine whether the program is aligned with Connecticut's standards. There is no particular way in which the program must demonstrate it is aligned. These visits, which occur every five years for each program, on a rolling basis across programs, are the only times at which programs are assessed regarding integration of the state standards.

There has never been a comprehensive, point-in-time review of all the Connecticut teacher preparation programs by SDE or any other organization to determine to what extent compliance with the regulation requiring alignment with the teaching standards (R.C.S.A. Sec. 10-145d-11) is occurring across the system. It is unclear how fully teacher preparation programs integrate the state teaching standards into their curricula.

SDE staff, mentors, and cooperating teachers believe the programs are beginning to more closely align their programs with the state standards. Whether the programs are shifting fundamentally to become aligned or simply complying with the regulation at a minimum level, to retain accreditation, is not known. For example, most, if not all, teacher preparation programs require their candidates to complete a portfolio of their student teaching. Some programs cite this as an example of integrating BEST into the curricula. However, the extent to which those portfolios require students to apply and document the use of the concepts of effective teaching, which are at the core of the BEST portfolio, may vary.

The committee recognizes teacher preparation programs value the characteristics that make them unique; state regulation, however, requires accredited programs to instruct candidates according to the state's teaching standards and competencies. The rationale for this requirement is logical: without instructing teacher candidates in how to teach according to the standards, it is unreasonable to expect beginning educators to teach according to the standards, let alone demonstrate how to do so in a formal, state-administered assessment centered on such standards, as required for certification purposes under BEST.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should undertake a comprehensive review of the alignment of all the accredited teacher preparation programs with the state's teaching standards as contained in the Common Core of Teaching. The review should also examine how the program approval process can be used by the department of education to ensure teacher preparation programs fully align with the state's teaching standards.

SDE attempted several years ago to assist teacher preparation programs in aligning with the teaching standards through organizing an effort to create a universal student teaching evaluation matrix (i.e., rubric) closely based on the CCT. This work was funded by a federal Teacher Quality Enhancement (Title II) grant. Most preparation programs participated in the instrument's development and finalization, but only eight currently use the rubric to assess candidates during student teaching. Whether the remaining 12 teacher preparation programs evaluate their teacher candidates during student teaching using state standards as outlined in the student teaching evaluation rubric is not known.

Student teaching is a prospective teacher's closest experience to teaching in one's own classroom. During student teaching, each teacher candidate should be expected to demonstrate knowledge and initial application of the state standards in order to prepare for what will be expected of him or her, as a full-fledged teacher in Connecticut. The program review committee believes the developed student teaching rubric is a valuable tool in ensuring candidates are well-prepared to become teachers who meet Connecticut's state teaching standards.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should require teacher preparation programs to use a standards-based student teaching rubric. The department should require each program to either adopt the rubric already developed, adding on to it if desired as currently is permitted, or to submit its own rubric for approval or rejection. If a program's own rubric is rejected by the department of education, the program should be required to use the standards-based rubric until a sufficient rubric is submitted and approved.

Portfolio Performance of Graduates

Between two sets of recent, combined portfolio cycles – 2003 and 2004, and 2006 and 2007 – most teacher preparation programs saw the percent of their graduates failing the portfolio decline, as depicted in Table III-1. It is possible the declines are evidence the teacher preparation programs have begun to better align their curricula with the state standards and to improve their candidates' preparation for the BEST portfolio. Other reasons for the declines also are possible, such as better provision of support during graduates' initial years of teaching or simple chance, due to the short timeframe under examination.

In general, there are not statistically significant differences in the rates most program graduates fail the portfolio. The portfolio failure rates of different preparation programs vary, but only four programs had failure rates for the combined 2006 and 2007 cycles that were significantly different (either higher or lower) from the overall rates (see Table III-1). Sometimes programs with low failure rates across the portfolio categories – Quinnipiac University, St. Joseph College, and UConn – had too few portfolio submissions in particular categories to make these low rates statistically significant.

An examination of the performance of out-of-state program graduates reveals this group's failure rates also have dropped, falling below (although not significantly) the overall failure rates in two of the three portfolio categories. This is a change from previous years, and portfolio failure rates of Connecticut teacher preparation programs are no longer lower than those of out-of-state programs.

Chapter Four: Support

Description

Graduates of teacher preparation programs who pass the Praxis II exam are recommended to SDE for initial certification. Those who obtain teaching positions in Connecticut are immediately entered into the BEST program, along with college graduates who have not yet completed a teacher preparation program but are teaching under Durational Shortage Area Permits (DSAPs).

Once in the BEST program, participants are to receive mentoring support from their local school districts for one year, along with support provided at the state level. ARC graduates and teachers working under DSAPs receive two years of mentoring and other support. The State Department of Education is responsible for overseeing the support component of BEST. Providing BEST support for beginning teachers is a statutory requirement that aims to integrate them into the profession as high-quality teachers and prepare them for the BEST assessment.

A wide variety of individuals and organizations offers BEST support to beginning teachers. At the local level, trained individual mentors and mentor teams work most closely with beginning teachers, helping them in at least their first years to succeed and improve. School and district-level administrators, master mentors, and veteran teachers may also provide support. At the state level, the RESC field staff offers both training and individual assistance to all these support groups. SDE provides online learning units focused on developing effective teaching techniques, printed handbooks describing BEST and the portfolio, and portfolio-focused seminars to beginning teachers.

The various types of formal support offered through BEST and their purposes are summarized in Table IV-1. More detailed descriptions of the support provided at the district level and through state sources are highlighted below. The committee's findings and recommendations on support follow.

District Level Support

Mentors

State law requires local school districts to support beginning teachers through mentoring. For most beginning teachers, districts are required to provide support during the novices' first year of teaching.²³ Beyond that, districts have the discretion whether to provide beginning teachers with additional mentor support.

Formal requirements for mentoring. State regulations, internal BEST policies and procedures, and formal reference guides distributed as part of the BEST program all describe the requirements for mentoring. These reference sources, however, vary regarding the actual level of mentor support required. Most sources prescribe different degrees of mentor commitment, as highlighted in Table IV-2. The committee recognizes that several mentor support guidelines given by the table's sources differ from the regulatory requirements. The department also recognizes this and states that its definition of support outlined in the table's various source documents has expanded from the original regulatory intent to include district-based induction programs or processes.²⁴

BEST regulations require mentors meet weekly with the beginning teacher and formally record the meetings. The mentor also should observe or be observed by the mentee on at least eight occasions throughout the school year, via four days of release time provided by the school district. Release time is administrator-approved, district-funded time spent working but outside the classroom. These requirements, in various wordings, have generally been in regulation since the implementation of BEST in 1989.

SDE's internal BEST Program Policy and Procedures Manual (2005-06) sets forth different meeting and release time expectations. The mentor and beginning teacher should meet at least biweekly but there is no mention of a recording requirement or recommendation. Over the year, the beginning teacher must have at least 30 hours of “significant contacts” with the mentor(s), content colleague(s), principal, or district facilitator. Districts should provide eight half-days of release time for beginning teachers to observe or be observed, or to engage in professional development.

Other BEST publications give additional guidelines. A Guide to the BEST Program for Beginning Teachers, 2006-2007, which is a handbook providing comprehensive overviews of the program requirements and resources distributed to beginning teachers, differs from the Policy and Procedures Manual. The Guide includes regularly scheduled staff meetings in the 30 required hours of significant contacts. In addition, the Guide states districts should provide eight and a half days of release time from the classroom, for either observation or professional development. (SDE has subsequently indicated the Guide was in error and was corrected in the 2007-08 version to read “eight half days.”)

Two key providers of BEST support receive still different mentoring guidelines. The District Facilitator Manual, distributed to each district's BEST coordinator as described later in this chapter, interprets the 30 hours as equal to “one-half hour of contact on a weekly basis over 36 weeks, plus 8 occasions of 1 ½ hour classroom observations/conferences.” In addition, district facilitators should work to secure release time for beginning teachers and mentors, although no amount is stated. SDE's A Statement of Understanding, which is signed by teachers who complete mentor training, stipulates mentors must meet at least biweekly with their mentees and does not address release time.

Duties and responsibilities. Mentors provide beginning teachers with the most direct and on-going support. According to state regulation (R.C.S.A. Sec. 10-220a-6), mentors' overall tasks are to develop their beginning teachers' skills, in accordance with the state standards, and help them prepare for the BEST assessment throughout at least the first year. A Guide to the BEST Program for Beginning Teachers, 2006-2007 explains that mentors specifically should assist beginning teachers in:

Mentors complete these tasks in two main ways. First, they meet with beginning teachers formally throughout the year to share information and provide feedback on lesson plans, teaching techniques, student assessment, and school culture. Mentors generally meet with their beginning teachers during shared breaks in teaching, or before or after classes. Some administrators facilitate mentoring by scheduling mentors and their mentees for the same lunch or preparation periods. Second, mentors should observe and be observed by their mentees to facilitate dialogue leading to beginning teachers' improvement.

The state requires mentors to work with their assigned beginning teachers throughout the first year. School districts may choose to extend formal mentoring into the beginning teacher's second year. Between 76 and 88 percent of school districts have such a policy, according to two recent SDE surveys of district facilitators.²⁵

Recruitment and selection. Personnel mainly at the district level recruit teachers to become mentors who first meet the initial requirements. School district officials and principals encourage teachers they view as having higher-level teaching ability as well as leadership qualities to become mentors. Some principals purposefully recruit veteran teachers of the same areas or grade levels as incoming beginning teachers. SDE and RESC field staffs also help recruit prospective mentors. For example, at portfolio scoring, department of education project leaders ask all scorers to consider becoming mentors.

Each district is required to establish its own process for nominating mentors.²⁶ Neither SDE nor the RESC field staff monitors how or whether each school district does this. BEST regulations state that the pool of nominees should be narrowed by a district committee that oversees BEST resource personnel selection. This committee must be representative by teaching level, include both teacher and administrator bargaining representatives, and have a teacher majority. A prospective mentor should present evidence (via an application) that he or she meets the mentor qualifications. The committee is to consider the application, giving preference to those who: 1) completed BEST portfolios; 2) are portfolio scorers; or 3) earned National Board for Professional Teaching Standards certification.²⁷ The district committee is to recommend its nominees to the local board of education, which makes the final decision. After educators register for training to become mentors, EastConn checks with the districts to ensure formal approval was given for the teachers to attend the training.

To become a mentor, a teacher must be experienced, suited for the position, and trained. Since 1993, a prospective mentor has been required to have:

Any teachers or administrators who are qualified and approved by their district are eligible to go through mentor training and become mentors. Most mentors are current teachers with full-time teaching duties. According to SDE, mentors could also be teachers or administrators who are working part-time, on temporary leave, or recently retired, as long they have a valid Connecticut teaching certificate, although the BEST regulations do not permit educators who are not currently teaching to mentor.

SDE records the names of all eligible mentors and of mentors who are assigned to beginning teachers, but it does not track the proportions of mentors by current employment status. The percent of educators qualified to be mentors varies by school district and a school's staff turnover rates and experience levels.

Training. Educators must complete formal state training to become mentors or maintain their mentor status. Training differs for new and experienced mentors.

Teachers who want to become mentors must attend one of three trainings. Nearly all prospective mentors choose the three-day “Initial Support Teacher Training” (IST). Each RESC holds two sessions of the IST training, summer and fall. IST prepares teachers to serve as both mentors and cooperating teachers²⁸ by providing information and exercises on:

Teachers who are already trained portfolio scorers and want to be mentors may participate in the single-day “Mentor Training for Portfolio Scorers,” held each fall at several locations throughout the state. Because these participants are already familiar with the CCT standards and BEST portfolio process, this training focuses on addressing beginning teachers' needs and effective mentoring strategies. Further, science teachers who want to become mentors and portfolio scorers may be trained for both roles simultaneously through the one-week Science Leadership Academy, which is described in Chapter Five.

Table IV-3 portrays how many new mentors attended each type of training for the 2006-07 school year (SY). In total, 1,245 teachers attended training for new mentors. Of those prospective mentors, the bulk was trained through the IST training.

According to information from interviews by committee staff, before the beginning teacher assessment method changed to the portfolio process in 1999-00, mentor training was considerably different. The training did not as heavily emphasize effective teaching methods, coaching strategies, or the state standards, because most veteran teachers were comfortable with what was then expected of every teacher. Many experienced educators, however, were unfamiliar with teaching as demanded by the CCT and the portfolio. As a result, mentor training was substantially revised to teach veteran educators how to both implement the state CCT standards and motivate beginning teachers to reach those standards.

At training, the new mentors receive binders with materials to help them support beginning teachers. Examples of materials are conversation guides and suggestions on how to solve common teaching problems. Teachers who are trained as mentors must agree to work with a beginning teacher if asked at any point over the next two years following their training.

Training for experienced mentors. Mentors are not formally required to receive follow-up training once initially trained. SDE, however, recommends all mentors update their training every four years by attending one day of additional instruction. Update training helps mentors polish skills, keep abreast of new techniques, and learn about any changes to the portfolio. Mentors who need to update their training should be verbally reminded by their district facilitators annually, until they attend a workshop.

Experienced mentors may choose to participate in either “Portfolio Support Training” (PST) or, new in 2007-08, “Coaching for Instructional Excellence,” to update their training. Each is offered once a year by every RESC.

Although SDE strongly advises mentors to update their training, mentors may continue to support beginning teachers without doing so. About 8,700 of the nearly 15,000 trained, teaching, and available mentors (approximately 59 percent) were overdue for update training in May 2007.

The original BEST regulations provided for SDE-led mentor update and follow-up trainings. SDE had to provide update training for mentors who had not mentored in three years or more. In addition, SDE was to hold follow-up training that mentors were responsible for attending, but no specific frequency or topics were specified.

Mentor assignment process. Ideally, mentors and beginning teachers teach in the same building, content area, and grade level. There are several situations in which an exact match is not possible, however. First, in small schools or for particular positions like special education, the beginning teacher may be the only teacher in that content area or grade level. Second, a school may have few trained mentors to serve a large beginning teacher group. Third, a school with frequent teacher turnover may simply lack educators with the experience and training necessary to mentor.

Current statutes and regulations do not provide mentoring match guidelines beyond both the beginning teacher and mentor be stationed in the same building. While some districts choose to assign a mentor who teaches in the same building, others opt to designate a mentor from another school within the district who teaches the same subject or grade. Regardless of the actual arrangement, each beginning teacher is to have a “mentor of record” and the name of this mentor must be on file with SDE.

In certain situations, a beginning teacher is assigned a mentor team, also called a support team. The team is composed of teachers, and sometimes administrators, with expertise that the single mentor of record lacks. For example, a beginning teacher could be assigned a trained mentor from another school who teaches the same subject at the same grade level, but she or he would also be given a support team composed of one or two in-building teachers. This arrangement gives the beginning teacher content- and grade level-specific pedagogical and instructional assistance from the assigned mentor, and help in understanding the school's culture from the support team members. The team is led by a trained mentor, but the other members need not complete any type of formal support training. Principals, department chairs, and other supervisors, along with teachers, may be part of a mentor team, but they cannot be a mentor of record due to their roles in evaluating beginning teachers. SDE does not monitor the frequency of or participation in support teams.

There are a few differences among guidelines regarding who assigns mentors to beginning teachers. According to the District Facilitator Manual, as developed through SDE, the BEST district facilitator is charged with ensuring beginning teachers are matched to mentors within 10 days of either hiring or the first day of teaching. This task is assigned only generally to the district by regulation. Each August, the district facilitator sends the names of all the district's beginning teachers to SDE. The department then sends every district facilitator a list of the district's qualified mentors that shows each mentor's school, date of most recent training, and primary teaching assignment. The district facilitator uses these documents to match beginning teachers to mentors. The facilitator is encouraged by the Manual to work closely with curriculum supervisors and principals in assigning mentors.

The current BEST regulations, however, state that the district facilitator needs only to provide school administrators with the lists of beginning teachers and mentors. Then, building-level administrators are to assign mentors.²⁹

Regardless of how a mentoring match is determined, mentors may be assigned to assist one, several, or no beginning teachers in a given year, depending on their school and district volume of beginning teachers and mentors. In the 2006-07 school year, 14 percent of all mentor matches involved a mentor working with more than one beginning teacher; most of these mentors were assigned to two teachers. The initial BEST statute stipulated that a mentor may have only one beginning teacher, but this requirement is no longer in place.

If a mentor match is not working, the beginning teacher, mentor, and administrator may end the pairing. The district committee is charged with developing the process for reviewing and approving such discontinuations. Because a beginning teacher must be mentored for the whole first year, presumably he or she is then assigned a different mentor.

Oversight. District facilitators are responsible for monitoring and ensuring mentors provide support. Throughout the school year, district facilitators are to “verify that beginning teachers and mentors are meeting together regularly and that appropriate support is provided to each beginning teacher,” according to the District Facilitator Manual. There is no formal oversight process at the state level to ensure district facilitators carry out this duty, nor are there consequences if district facilitators do not monitor and provide for mentoring.

Currently, according to the BEST Program Policy and Procedures Manual, districts should record support activities and SDE may review those records. SDE review of mentoring occurs only when a beginning teacher has asked the department for additional time to complete the portfolio on the grounds that he or she has received insufficient support. In this case, SDE may examine whatever evidence of support the district chooses to provide; however, the district is not required to keep mentoring records.

SDE has noted some school districts choose to monitor mentors by requiring logs or other verification. Many, if not all, of these districts provide mentor stipends through their own funds. The number of school districts that require mentor documentation is not tracked at the state level.

Neither SDE nor the RESCs have issued formal recommendations to districts on consequences for mentors who are failing to complete their duties. SDE staff believes that the beginning teachers matched to these mentors should be reassigned for that particular year.

Support for mentors. Mentors may receive support and technical assistance from a variety of sources. These include RESCs, district facilitators, master mentors, and school districts.

RESCs provide mentors with a few types of guidance in addition to trainings. First, each RESC offers a Mentor Seminar Series held three evenings throughout the year. Participants explore new strategies and materials on effective teaching. The series does not count as mentor update training.

Second, mentors who are having trouble working with their beginning teachers may contact the RESC field staff for personal assistance. Individual mentors needing guidance regarding the portfolio assessment also may contact SDE project leaders and teachers-in-residence. Third, starting in fall 2007, a guide for mentors is given to all new mentors at training and posted on the program's website.

At the local level, mentors are assisted by the district facilitator and, where available, by master mentors (described below). The district facilitator may arrange meetings for mentors, sometimes in combination with their beginning teachers, to discuss how to fulfill beginning teachers' needs. Master mentors should meet regularly and as needed with mentors in their building or district.

Stipends. Some districts give mentors financial compensation for their time and effort. As mentioned earlier, when BEST was first implemented in 1989 SDE provided a $1,000 stipend directly to each mentor upon receiving a log from him or her. The amount stayed the same, regardless of how many teachers an individual mentor worked with, but was pro-rated if a full school year of mentoring was not completed.

When the program's budget was severely cut in the early 1990s, SDE eliminated direct mentor stipends and provided districts a limited payment of $200 per beginning teacher for professional development purposes. This funding could be spent in any way that would assist the beginning teacher, including providing stipends for mentors. Some districts did use these funds for stipends, either alone or in conjunction with district monies, with different degrees of mentor accountability. This funding was eliminated in the early 2000s, yet federal law expanded the use of Title II funds to include paying stipends to mentors. SDE began encouraging districts to use any available federal Title II funds in this way.

Committee staff analyzed collective bargaining agreements and the district facilitator surveys to determine the frequency and amounts of mentor stipends, as well as other types of mentor benefits. Today, at least 99 local and regional school districts, including two public academies, offer mentor stipends.³⁰ Although most stipends are approximately $500, they range from $100 to $1,500 for one year of mentoring. Some districts give additional amounts for mentoring more than one beginning teacher and for mentoring the same beginning teacher(s) over two years. Table IV-4 shows basic information on stipends and other contracted benefits for mentors, such as reduced duties or release time.³¹ Some districts may provide mentors benefits that are not stipulated in the collective bargaining agreements; these districts' information is not included in this report. (Appendix F provides more information on mentor stipends and other benefits by district.) From committee staff's interviews, most districts that provide stipends have some type of mentor accountability. Overall, though, accountability varies from no district oversight to supervision through required logs.

District Facilitators

State regulations require each school district to appoint a district facilitator for the BEST program.³² District facilitators are the main contact person for the BEST program at the local level. They serve as the direct link between SDE and individual school districts. Nearly all districts, regardless of size, choose only one district facilitator. District facilitators must be school district employees, although some districts use retirees or individuals on contract with the districts as district facilitators. They are principally guided by the District Facilitator Manual developed by SDE.

By state regulations, district facilitators must:

Additional responsibilities of school districts are listed in regulation, but these are the only obligations specifically assigned to district facilitators.

Duties and responsibilities. The overall responsibility of district facilitators is to ensure the BEST support program is implemented at the district level. According to the District Facilitator Manual, every district facilitator must:

In practice, the main BEST support responsibility of district facilitators is ensuring beginning teachers have access to mentoring. One aspect of this is securing release time. By the Manual, district facilitators are charged with approaching administrators to organize time during the school day for meetings and observations between beginning teachers and mentors (i.e., release time). District facilitators also should verify that beginning teachers are receiving support throughout the year.

RESC field staff recently has been asking district facilitators to spend more time working with principals and district officials, as part of an effort to boost administrator involvement in BEST. District facilitators are encouraged to have conversations with them about the program and how to support beginning teachers.

Recruitment and selection. Each summer, every district must select a district facilitator. The superintendent is ultimately responsible for naming the district facilitator, but may choose to delegate the task to another district official. The district facilitator may be anyone in the district: a full- or part-time teacher, a principal, an assistant superintendent, or anyone else at either the district or school level. No particular levels or years of experience are required. Once chosen, school districts are responsible for sending the names of their district facilitators to the State Department of Education via EastConn.

Annual and within-year turnover is an issue among district facilitators. Using SDE data on district facilitators, about 17 percent of district facilitators in 2006-07 had not held that position the previous school year.

Training. RESC field staff work closely with new district facilitators on an individual basis. In the late summer and early fall, every new district facilitator is provided an opportunity to meet with a RESC field staff member to review the manual for the position, ask questions, and receive additional guidance. In addition, sometimes new district facilitators meet as a small group in conjunction with the two regular district facilitator meetings led by the region's field staff member. New district facilitators are encouraged to call RESC field staff at any time for additional assistance.

Oversight. District facilitators are not monitored directly by SDE. According to the department's contract with EastConn, RESC field staff must provide training and technical assistance to them, but not oversight. Beginning in the 2007-08 school year, RESC field staff are attempting to systematically contact returning district facilitators in the fall and all facilitators in the spring.

The field staff intends to raise three new subjects during the conversations to encourage district facilitators to take an active role in induction. First, the field staff will try to learn what specific actions each district facilitator and district is taking to promote induction. The field staff plans to disseminate the resulting list of induction practices to districts. Second, a new way of managing data will enable field staff to supply district-specific information to district facilitators during the conversations. Third, the field staff also will ask district facilitators whether their districts formally record and track support for beginning teachers.

District facilitators are not obligated or encouraged to submit verification of mentoring to SDE, aside from the requisite mentor match information. Further, when SDE provided mentoring stipends, the district facilitators had no role in ensuring or documenting mentoring actually occurred. As such, there are no consequences set at the state or RESC levels for district facilitators who do not perform their duties. School districts may have their own internal policies regarding district facilitator performance.

Support for district facilitators. District facilitators receive guidance from RESC field staff and SDE. RESC field staff:

Over the last few years, the RESC field staff has focused on assisting district facilitators in urban areas. Examples of this assistance include the field staff members meeting regularly with those in their region and helping them design beginning teacher orientations. To augment the targeted support to urban district facilitators, any facilitator may call RESC field staff for help.

SDE gives district facilitators materials to use and distribute within their districts. Prior to the start of each school year, district facilitators receive guides to BEST, presentation slides, and flyers advertising the beginning teacher seminars. The district facilitators are to hand out and present these materials at either the district's orientation for beginning teachers or at a separate BEST introductory meeting for the group, held by the district facilitator. Each October, the facilitators are sent BEST Program Resource CDs that contain the program's Guide, the Common Core of Teaching, portfolio handbooks for each content area, a science lab safety simulation, and certification application forms. District facilitators are expected to distribute the CDs to mentors and support team members throughout the district. (As discussed later, beginning teachers are sent the BEST Program Resource CDs directly by the department of education each fall.)

Stipends. Some districts provide facilitators who have other, non-BEST duties with stipends. As discussed earlier, committee staff analyzed contract information for the districts and public academies whose teachers are represented by the state's two unions. From this review, seven district contracts specifically mention stipends for district facilitators. Their compensation ranges from $400 to more than $2,500 as shown by Table IV-5. Some districts may provide district facilitators with stipends, outside of the contract provisions.

Master Mentors

Another level of support at the local level for beginning teachers is provided through “master mentors.” Master mentors are experienced educators who provide additional guidance to beginning teachers and mentors at the school or district levels. Master mentoring was developed by the BEST policy team, described earlier, in response to two needs. First, beginning teachers wanted portfolio assistance but many mentors were not fully familiar with the assessment. Second, according to SDE, the program needed school-level leaders to help create positive change in teaching. About 125 teachers from 44 school districts have been trained as master mentors since the program began in the 2002-03 school year.

Duties and responsibilities. Master mentors serve as the liaisons between district facilitators and individual schools. They may also assist their district facilitators in monitoring and helping both mentors and beginning teachers across their districts. Although the master mentor role is neither required nor described by regulation, they are expected to:

Recruitment and selection. The master mentor selection process is run through the school district. Each spring, SDE notifies all district facilitators that districts may apply to send teachers to master mentor training. Superintendents ultimately decide whether their districts will become involved in the program. Districts choosing to participate must each submit an application to SDE, explaining what support the district currently offers, how the district will assist the master mentor, and which schools are interested in participating. The superintendent, district facilitator, and involved principal(s) must nominate one master mentor per included building through a process of their determination. No complete applications have been denied by SDE.

The application also records the “mutual expectations” agreement of the district facilitator and principal(s) to:

The mutual expectations agreement was created and implemented in the program's second year after master mentors' initial experiences revealed communication among the district facilitator, principals, and master mentors is key to success.

Master mentor nominees are chosen by the district; they do not submit separate applications to SDE. To qualify, master mentor nominees must be experienced BEST mentors and portfolio scorers. In addition, they must have either served as trainers of their colleagues in a professional development or similar capacity, or been trained to do so. Recently, some teachers are choosing to become master mentors to fulfill their professional development goals.

Training. Master mentor nominees are trained for three days throughout the year by RESC field staff, with assistance from SDE teachers-in-residence. The nominees train prior to the year in which they will begin to serve as master mentors. The sessions focus on facilitation, communication, and developing plans on how they will work with mentors, beginning teachers, and building administrators. Participants also review the Common Core of Teaching, BEST, and portfolio concepts specific to certain content areas. Master mentors who choose to attend an additional one-day session become qualified to lead Initial Support Teacher and Portfolio Support Trainings in their own districts.

Support and oversight. Trained master mentors meet annually in early fall to discuss strategies for successfully fulfilling their role and meeting needs. They also must attend mentor update training. Master mentors who require individual assistance throughout the year contact their region's RESC field staff person.

Master mentor compensation and oversight varies. In a few districts, master mentors receive higher stipends than their district's regular mentors. The three situations in which this occurs are detailed in Table IV-6. Master mentors' performance is not systematically monitored by RESC field staff or SDE. Similarly, neither is the level of school districts' support for master mentors monitored.

Lead Mentors

The lead mentor concept will be piloted in the New Haven school district in the 2007-08 school year. Training began in the summer and will continue in the fall, with implementation occurring throughout the school year. The pilot program's design is similar to the master mentor concept. Lead mentors will be expected to support mentors and beginning teachers, encourage administrators to provide induction support, and spur change in teaching methods.

The program was created to meet these needs in districts that have few portfolio scorers and, therefore, lack teachers eligible to become master mentors. Lead mentors must have already mentored, but are not required to have completed portfolio scorer training. SDE and the RESC field staff have not yet decided whether lead mentors will be able to train teachers to become mentors, as master mentors may do.

District/School Orientation

Orientation held at the district or school levels is not part of BEST but it is a source of support for beginning teachers. In addition, orientation may be a beginning teacher's first introduction to BEST.

School districts are not required by state statute or regulations to offer orientations before the school year begins or when a new teacher is hired. Although the exact number is not tracked by SDE, the department notes most local districts provide some sort of formal orientation for beginning teachers.³³ The orientation may be led by school district personnel, RESC field staff, union representatives, or a combination thereof. Orientation varies in leadership, scope, and length, depending on each district's policies.

According to RESC field staff, some school districts offer multiple orientations or a program that lasts a few months. Others provide orientations of just a few hours. Similarly, topics covered during orientations differ. Districts may choose simply to cover contract information and basic district policies; others may opt to familiarize beginning teachers with the community, curriculum, BEST, and effective teaching strategies. Additional orientation topics can include district coordinators' roles, special education, classroom management, and instructional technology. Some districts also involve BEST mentors in their orientations.

BEST offers some guidance regarding orientation. An Administrator's Guide to New Teacher Induction, a summary document about the program and an administrator's role within it, encourages principals to offer building-level orientation that includes:

State Level Support

State Department of Education

SDE offers a range of assistance to beginning teachers and other educators involved in BEST. Formal trainings, web-based information, and BEST resource materials all are provided through the department. Specifically, SDE provides portfolio-centered orientations and seminars for beginning teachers, as well as a formal professional development experience for veteran teachers. Table IV-7 below gives an overview of trainings and seminars held by SDE.

BEST orientation. During the original implementation of BEST, SDE offered large-group orientations to the program for all beginning first-year teachers. These sessions covered only the assessment component of the program. In the mid-1990s, school districts asked that information on the BEST portfolio simply be incorporated into their regular beginning teacher orientations. SDE agreed to give portfolio materials to district facilitators each year, for use in district orientations.

Since then, SDE has offered one beginning teacher orientation to the portfolio at each RESC annually in the late fall. SDE encourages only those who did not attend a regular district orientation to attend the state-level orientation. Such teachers usually either are from districts that did not offer an orientation because of small size or were hired after regular orientation had been offered. In fall 2006, less than six percent of all first-year teachers participating in BEST registered for an SDE orientation (according to data provided by EastConn and SDE, 141 of 2,402 teachers registered as Year One BEST participants attended an SDE orientation.)

Content seminars. All beginning teachers who must complete BEST portfolios are strongly encouraged by SDE to attend a series of three content-specific seminars. SDE holds between one and three sessions of each seminar throughout the state for each of the ten content areas. The exact number of sessions depends on how many beginning teachers work in the area. For example, in 2006-07 one session of each seminar type was held for Visual Arts teachers, while for Elementary Education teachers, an area in which nearly half of beginning teachers currently teach, six sessions of each type were offered, with every session having multiple groups of seminar leaders and attendees. Beginning teachers learn of the seminars through their mentors, district facilitators, letters from SDE, and the BEST websites.

Each of the seminars covers different topics. The first of the three seminars, intended for beginning teachers in the spring of their first year, introduces teachers to the portfolio. Leaders explain the teaching practices the portfolio intends to promote, required tasks, and how the assessment is scored. The second and third seminars in the series are designed for beginning teachers in the fall of their second year of teaching. The second seminar, which focuses on instructional design, provides a connection between the portfolio and the state's teaching standards, strategies on how to successfully complete the portfolio, and examinations of exemplar portfolios and scoring rubrics (discussed in Chapter Five). The third seminar concentrates on how to assess student learning and use that knowledge for adjusting instruction. Participants also view video components of portfolio submissions and speak with teachers who completed the assessment. All beginning teacher trainings are created by SDE project leaders but presented by teachers-in-residence and portfolio assessment leaders. Seminar logistics are handled by part-time staff hired by each RESC specifically to handle these tasks for all seminars within the RESC's region.

According to SDE information, in 2006-07 more than two-thirds of first-year teachers registered for the first content seminar. Nearly 90 percent of beginning teachers completing the portfolio that year (second-year teachers) registered for the second and third seminars. Because beginning teachers register for the second and third seminars together, as one course, it is impossible to determine what percent intended to attend either or both. Furthermore, only seminar registration – not attendance – is recorded.

Teacher Leadership Academy. Veteran teachers in grades K-8 who are already portfolio scorers can participate in the Teacher Leadership Academy program, which began in September 2005. This program is run by two experienced BEST staff with expertise in elementary and special education, and by a Connecticut State University system professor who teaches educational leadership.

The program is designed to attract teachers who want to further their knowledge of effective teaching. During the first year of the program, participants are guided through studies of their own classrooms to discover strategies for solving instructional problems. Over the second year, participants help their non-Academy colleagues implement these strategies in their classrooms.

Due to the time commitment and rigor of the program, prospective teachers who want to participate are screened by SDE for their motivation and interest in professional development. Twenty-two of the 35 original participants completed the program's first cycle, which was only open to elementary school teachers, in spring 2007. It is anticipated program alumna will become advisors to the second group of Academy participants. An added benefit of the program is that graduates are qualified to serve as BEST mentors.

Computer-based resources. In addition to trainings, SDE offers a variety of computer-based resources for beginning teachers, mentors, scorers, and administrators. Anyone may access BEST-related materials through either of two websites: www.ctbest.org (described below) or the department's BEST home page.³⁴ The web-based materials currently include:

The online courses, first launched in the 2001-02 school year, provide explanations and examples of the teaching concepts embedded in the portfolio. Each course includes five topical units. For example, in 2006-07, the social studies units were: an overview of the BEST social studies program; an overview of designing effective social studies instruction; inquiry-based instruction;³⁵ assessment of student learning; and reflection on teaching. Every unit across content areas is composed of a:

In addition to posting the online resources, every fall the department sends BEST Program Resource CDs directly to first and second year beginning teachers. Before SDE began sending out BEST Program Resource CDs in the fall of 2002, it delivered hard copies of the Guide and portfolio handbooks to beginning teachers. SDE continues to publish, although not widely distribute, hard copies of the Guide.

The CD contains the Guide, portfolio handbooks, certification forms, the CCT, and the Science Lab Safety Simulation. The science lab simulation focuses on how to identify and solve dangerous situations in a science lab. SDE launched it as a computer-based assessment in 1994 through National Science Foundation funding because many new teachers were not properly trained in lab safety. Until 2000, every new science teacher was required to complete the simulation at one of the RESCs, as a test. However, the assessment was expensive, so science teachers no longer must formally complete it. SDE sends the simulation on CD to every science supervisor and strongly encourages them to give it to their teachers, as either an exercise or assessment.³⁶

Regional Educational Support Centers

EastConn field staff schedule and coordinate both SDE- and RESC-led BEST trainings. Trainings are developed and coordinated by the RESC field staff, in conjunction with the BEST policy team. The policy team approves any major additions or changes to the trainings. The manuals used for training are updated annually to meet new needs perceived by the department or RESC field staff, sometimes based on feedback received from training participants. Responsibility for producing the training materials and disseminating them to the field staff is centralized in one RESC, Area Cooperative Educational Services (ACES). The RESCs are responsible for most of the BEST-related trainings and materials offered to teachers and administrators. Trainings led by the field staff are summarized in Table IV-8 and described below.

Trainings and presentations. In addition to leading mentor training, the RESC field staff holds other sessions that help experienced educators understand how to support beginning teachers. For example, “Portfolio Support Training” and the “Coaching for Instructional Excellence” training are single-day workshops open to any teachers, although they count as mentor update trainings. PST covers how to help beginning teachers succeed on the BEST assessment and become more effective teachers. “Coaching for Instructional Excellence” focuses on guiding beginning teachers to better practices through reflective questioning. Participants receive professional development credits for completing each course.³⁷ Over the past few school years, about ten percent of the Portfolio Support Training registrants were non-mentors.

The RESC field staff also offers two workshops for administrators. These sessions were launched after RESC field staff and SDE realized administrator support, critical to successful induction and improving teaching, needed to be strengthened. The three-day “BEST Administrator Institute,” introduced in 2005-06, is held at four RESCs during each summer for superintendents, principals, department chairs, and other district administrative personnel. Participants explore the state CCT standards, BEST, how to conduct and use assessments, and tools to promote effective teaching and learning. The Administrator Institute has trained 254 leaders since it began; 161 of those attended from the summer of 2006 through the spring of 2007.

“New Teacher Induction: A Principal's Role,” begun in 2004-05, is a three-hour workshop held at each RESC in the fall for only principals. RESC field staff review the administrators' guide and the CCT, describe exemplary induction practices to meet beginning teachers' needs, and summarize BEST requirements. In the 2006-07 school year, 62 principals attended this training.

On-site training. Upon request, RESC field staff will conduct BEST training, either established sessions or newly created, on site at any individual school district. Provided a minimum level of attendance is met, the training is free; the district needs only to provide copied materials, refreshment costs, and custodial services.³⁸ If the minimum attendance threshold is not met, the district may choose to hold the training but will pay a fee. Further, each school district receives about two hours of any BEST-related professional development at no cost to the district. Many districts take advantage of this opportunity to have field staff work with beginning teachers, mentors, or administrators, according to RESC staff. Table IV-9 shows all in-district BEST trainings recently held by RESC field staff.

Field staff collects feedback from all participants in each in-district or RESC training session. The feedback is reviewed, used to adjust trainings, and then stored at ACES, the central training RESC.

In addition to trainings, every fall the RESC field staff volunteers to present on BEST and how managers can support beginning teachers at district monthly administrator meetings. A few districts accept this offer each year, according to the field staff.

BEST website. Since 2003, EastConn has maintained and updated a website named BEST Connections (www.ctbest.org). This website has three functions. First, teachers and administrators use it to register electronically for all BEST trainings and seminars. Second, educators may choose to sign up to receive periodic e-mails specific to their BEST role (e.g. mentor) and content area. The e-mails contain reminders of upcoming training dates and deadlines, as well as resources and tips relevant to BEST duties. Copies of the e-mails are posted on the website for the duration of the school year. Third, the website provides access to useful documents through posted resources, such as presentation materials for district facilitators, and links to the SDE online resources described above. As shown by Table IV-10 below, the website's usage has grown tremendously: by 2006-07, more than 17,800 people had registered for BEST Connections.

Administrator's Guide. In addition to the mentor and district facilitator guides, RESC field staff distributes An Administrator's Guide to New Teacher Induction every fall. The guides previously have been sent directly to all principals, but this year, district facilitators will receive them with instructions to pass them on to the group. Developed in the fall of 2005, the guide is a desk reference that covers many topics, such as:

Individual Assistance

Any educator involved in BEST may seek out district- or state-level assistance. Beginning teachers are encouraged to approach their mentors, master mentors where available, district facilitators, and EastConn for support. Those needing guidance on the portfolio are encouraged to first seek out mentors, if possible, and then SDE teachers-in-residence or project leaders. Contact information for RESC field staff, teachers-in-residence, and project leaders is available on the SDE website, BEST Connections website, and in portfolio handbooks, all the various Guides, and mentor training materials.

Findings and Recommendations

Rationale for Strong Support Programs

Recent research has shown strong support programs confer benefits on beginning teachers to the extent that net cost savings result. The savings are the product of two program effects: 1) beginning teachers' lower attrition due to a higher satisfaction level, and 2) their improved effectiveness from the induction assistance they receive. There also is some initial evidence that a strong induction program can positively impact student achievement.³⁹ This seems logical, since a strong support program should improve teacher quality, and research shows higher teacher quality is associated with higher student achievement.

The Alliance for Excellent Education defines a strong induction program as having substantive mentoring, ongoing professional development, common planning time with colleagues, access to a peer network outside the new teacher's school, and standards-based assessment.⁴⁰ Using these criteria and based on survey data, program data, and interviews, the committee finds Connecticut's induction program, BEST, currently is not a strong induction program. A standards-based assessment is the only high-quality induction program component experienced by all BEST participants; the other components are not offered to or meaningfully experienced by most beginning teachers in Connecticut.

New teachers leave the profession at a steep financial cost to districts. Generally, experts estimate the cost of replacing a beginning teacher who leaves at about 30 percent of salary plus benefits, as well as termination, vacancy, hiring, and training costs. The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (NCTAF) estimated in 2007 that in Hartford, the district's annual cost of new teacher turnover was $4,462,500.⁴¹ In a study of several of the state's districts, the Connecticut Center for School Change calculated the average district loses at least $14,862 for each beginning teacher who leaves.⁴²

The amount spent on replacing teachers can be cut by reducing teacher turnover through well-developed induction programs. A noted study on attrition and induction⁴³ found that nationally, after one year of teaching, 20 percent of new teachers left the profession and 21 percent switched districts, for a total attrition rate of 41 percent. A strong induction program, however, decreased the combined attrition rate to 27 percent. The strongest type of program resulted in an overall rate of 18 percent. In contrast, a weak induction program, with only mentoring (of unspecified quality) and some supportive communication from an administrator, resulted in no significant attrition change. The study demonstrated the importance of offering a strong system of support that combines induction components. Offering solely one or two types of support did not reduce attrition.

Additional research further indicates strong induction programs produce large, significant, positive effects on retention. California's Beginning Teacher Support and Assessment (BTSA) programs incorporate most of the elements of a strong induction program. As such, its participating schools showed an attrition rate of 9 percent over five years – about one-fourth the rate of those who did not participate in a similar program.⁴⁴ School districts in two large cities – Seattle and Rochester, New York – saw their teacher attrition rates drop by more than half when they adopted strong programs modeled after one long used by the Toledo district, which focuses on providing assistance through full-time mentors.⁴⁵

Another recent study found that a strong induction program both saved money and improved student achievement.⁴⁶ In the only cost-benefit analysis of induction programs to date, researchers found the program of a California district returned $1.66 for each $1 invested in the two-year program, over five years. Most of the benefit was due to the higher effectiveness of participating new teachers, as demonstrated by student achievement test gains; savings through higher teacher retention composed the remainder of the benefit. Nearly all states and districts, including Connecticut, lack the ability to connect student achievement test scores to individual teachers for the most part. This makes it impossible to judge the effects of most induction programs on student achievement. Connecticut is progressing toward such a system, however.

Studies in Tennessee, Boston, and Dallas also indicate the quality of teaching impacts student achievement. For example, the Tennessee study⁴⁷ found that, despite beginning at the same percentile, children with the least effective teachers for three years in a row had achievement test scores more than 50 percentile points lower than their peers who had the most effective teachers during the same period. The study also found that the effect of teaching quality is cumulative over time but not compensatory. In other words, one low-quality teacher can impact a student's achievement for many years, regardless of the quality of subsequent teachers.

The National Conference of State Legislatures, the National Governors Association, The Education Trust, and the Alliance for Excellent Education all agree: teacher quality is one of the most important factors impacting student achievement. Strong induction that moves beyond emotional support for beginning teachers to help improve the quality of teaching has the potential to positively impact student achievement.

Determining the effectiveness of induction program support components, as a whole, is difficult, because the programs vary substantially. States, districts, and universities have developed a wide range of supports for new teachers since the movement gained momentum in the 1980s. As research was published showing the benefits of strong programs, more programs – albeit of varying quality – were developed and offered. In 1984, eight states reported having a support program. By 1992, 34 states had one, with half mandating participation in a statewide program.⁴⁸ Currently, about 30 states have required programs; it is unclear how many provide funding for implementation of support.⁴⁹ (Connecticut discontinued directly funding mentor support in the early 1990s.) The programs vary in components, duration, intensity, purpose, oversight, and lead organization. Therefore, they cannot be lumped together for one definitive statement or study on the degree to which induction programs are effective.⁵⁰

Generally, research consistently finds that strong, multi-year support programs for beginning teachers produce positive results. There is little, if any, sound research showing positive results of basic induction programs with short-term or infrequent support. The best published, quantitative studies of particular programs, which found positive results, uniformly involved only strong, intensive initiatives.

Support models. Despite variations in induction program components, most have mentoring as their central focus. There are three mentoring models, although the details of the mentoring – for example, how frequently mentors and beginning teachers are expected to meet, and topics they are supposed to explore together – vary somewhat within any particular model.

The first is Connecticut's model. Mentors most often are teachers with full-time classroom teaching duties who work with beginning teachers whenever they can. Some programs, including Connecticut's as required by state regulation, also include a provision for release time a few times each year from classroom duties to facilitate mentoring.

The second model is being disseminated by the New Teacher Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz. This model involves releasing teachers from their classroom duties for at least two years to devote all their full-time hours to mentoring a caseload of beginning teachers. The model is used in New York City and Alaska (in close cooperation with the New Teacher Center); Seattle; Rochester, New York; and Toledo, which pioneered the concept in 1981.

The third model is defined by granting mentors part-time release from their classroom duties so they may devote the remainder of their time to mentoring. This model is followed in Syracuse.

Overview of BEST Support Provided

The primary goal of the BEST support component is to provide all beginning teachers with substantive assistance that integrates them into the profession and prepares them for the BEST standards-based assessment, as ways of improving teacher quality. Like most other induction programs, the BEST program support component is centered on mentoring (i.e., assistance from colleagues), as previously described. Mentoring currently is required only in the beginning teacher's first year under SDE's established policies; except for ARC graduates and those teaching under DSAPs, the duration of mentoring is not mentioned in statute or state regulations, but is considered a State Board of Education policy.

Inequities in support have been cited frequently by multiple constituencies and acknowledged by SDE. These assertions have never been fully quantified by a party that is not connected to stakeholders in the BEST program, and could not be substantiated because there is no statewide systematic data collection and analysis system for mentoring. Consequently, the program review committee independently surveyed all beginning teachers who had just completed their first or second years of teaching in Connecticut to acquire information on support they received. District facilitators also were surveyed to better understand the range of support offered at the district level. (See Appendix A for more detailed information on the surveys.)

The surveys conducted by the committee confirmed BEST support and satisfaction with it varies across the state, with beginning teachers working in the poorest urban districts (as represented by the District Reference Group (DRG) designation of “I”) reporting the lowest level of satisfaction with support.⁵¹ (Appendix G lists districts within each DRG.) Sixty-nine percent of all Year One respondents were “satisfied” with the overall level of support they received, but less than half (48 percent) of those who taught in DRG I districts were “satisfied.” Indeed, in almost every aspect covered by the survey, teachers in the poorest urban districts reported receiving significantly less support than their peers in wealthier districts, as shown in Table IV-11. District facilitators who responded to the survey confirmed the diversity in support and oversight of mentoring given at the district level, but not necessarily according to the district's DRG.

Mentoring, which is the focus of BEST support, is not given in a meaningful way to most beginning teachers. Although a majority of new teachers indicated they were satisfied with their mentors, further examination of survey results showed the majority received little or no substantive support. Substantive support is specific assistance that teachers can use throughout their careers to become better teachers and/or to perform well on the BEST portfolio. Examples of key types of specific support, which were included in the survey, are: 1) help plan lessons; 2) understand the BEST portfolio; 3) refine or learn teaching techniques; 4) make aware of program resources; and 5) understand the state's teaching standards. Fifty-nine percent of all Year One teachers who responded – and 80 percent of those in the poorest urban districts – received either one type of or no substantive assistance from their mentors, as shown in Table IV-12 below. This analysis shows the BEST support component is not meeting its basic goal of providing substantive support to all beginning teachers, particularly in DRG I districts.

Teachers might have indicated they were satisfied with their mentors, despite not receiving substantive assistance, because emotional support or help in becoming familiar with the school or district was provided. Although beginning teachers may value this non-substantive assistance, that type of guidance may not impact either their teaching quality or performance on the BEST assessment.

The above analysis shows discrepancies in the overall level and quality of support provided to beginning teachers within DRG I districts in comparison with beginning teachers in other DRGs. The committee believes the reasons for such discrepancies should be examined in more detail by SDE and recommendations should be made to strengthen the overall support beginning teachers in DRG I districts receive.

The State Department of Education shall examine why disparities exist in support for beginning teachers in school districts within District Reference Group I (as designated by the education department) compared to other school districts throughout the state and report its recommendations for addressing the disparities to the legislature's committee(s) of cognizance by February 1, 2009.

SDE has emphasized BEST's assessment element to the detriment of overseeing the support component. Since state funding cuts in the early 1990s, which caused the elimination of the state-funded mentor stipend, SDE has had little role in the mentoring structure. Implementation and tracking of the support component, to the extent it occurs, largely has devolved to the EastConn RESC, which holds a contract for implementing parts of BEST. The education department's focus on the assessment component for licensing purposes is somewhat understandable because the state has a larger, more direct, role in that aspect of BEST. The state organizes and oversees the assessment, while support is given mostly by local mentors.

SDE's focus on the assessment, however, has filtered down to the local level, leaving the support component to be perceived by many as less critical. The interviews and surveys conducted during this study revealed that, to many beginning teachers and their administrators, “BEST” is synonymous with “the portfolio,” not with an induction program encompassing both support and assessment. Further, the level at which BEST support is provided to beginning teachers varies across and within districts. Many educators attribute the variations in support to differing levels of administrator commitment at the district and individual school levels.

Although SDE has attempted to measure whether the assessment affects a broad range of indicators, the BEST program has not systematically measured whether Connecticut's support initiative, as one component of the program, has produced any positive results, including cost savings through reduced teacher attrition or higher teacher effectiveness measured by improved student performance. The program review committee believes that, given the varied implementation of support to beginning teachers, such a study would not find the current support component reaps consistent, meaningful, and lasting benefits for beginning teachers or their students.

Key changes, as discussed below, could strengthen the BEST support component into a more effective tool in providing beginning teachers with more consistent, meaningful mentoring over a longer period of time than is currently required. As the national research indicates, greater and more effective support to beginning teachers would result in cost savings and increased student achievement. Furthermore, if Connecticut is going to continue to have a formal state assessment tied to licensure of beginning teachers, a state-supported, consistently high-quality support component must be in place to assist new teachers in learning and practicing the skills they need for the assessment and their careers. The support component must also be measured at the state level to ensure it is achieving the desired results.

Oversight of Mentoring

Neither the quality nor the substance of mentoring is effectively monitored by SDE. The education department lacks a formal, systematic tracking system that would allow an analysis of whether the program is meeting established performance indicators, which also are not in place. EastConn, which keeps some SDE data on mentor matches, is required only to provide BEST trainings; full oversight of mentoring is not part of its contract.

SDE has made two efforts to collect information on mentoring. First, all beginning teachers submitting portfolios are required to turn in completed surveys regarding the quality of support and teacher preparation, as well as the usefulness of the portfolio. Because the teachers must write their Social Security numbers on the survey and submit it as part of their portfolios prior to scoring, the committee questions the overall candor and validity of the resulting data. In addition, the department does not use the portfolio survey information in any substantive manner on a regular basis. Second, SDE contracted with UConn in 2005-06 to conduct and analyze the results of a one-time survey in spring 2005 of all types of educators involved in BEST, including beginning teachers. SDE does not systematically gather or analyze information on BEST mentoring in any other way.

It is unclear to what extent mentoring is tracked or analyzed by most district-level BEST personnel. Three-quarters of the district personnel in charge of BEST at the district level, called BEST district facilitators, who responded to the committee's survey systematically check whether mentoring is occurring. This may seem a high percentage, but as the only direct link between SDE and the districts, the facilitators have the primary responsibility of ensuring mentoring is occurring at the school district level. If mentoring is not systematically checked and reported by all facilitators, then SDE cannot be fully assured mentoring is occurring.

Further, some district facilitator respondents reported contacting both beginning teachers and their mentors, while others responded they contact only one group. The committee believes this inconsistent oversight is insufficient, due to the fact about one in three committee survey respondents were not satisfied with their mentors (31 percent of Year One teachers and 35 percent of Year Two teachers). In addition, a small group of beginning teachers (about 5 percent) reported they did not receive required mentoring support at all.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should develop a data collection and evaluation system for accurately monitoring the mentoring component of BEST. As part of the data collection system, the department should require the name(s) not only of the mentor, as is currently expected, but also, when assigned, of mentor team members to be submitted by the district as part of the beginning teacher's staff file within SDE. The data collected should be used to improve the quality and relevance of mentoring required under BEST.

The committee recommends the State Department of Education should keep its mentoring monitoring efforts separate from any surveys or documents relating to assessment submitted by the beginning teachers to their mentors and/or to the department.

Currently, only the name of the beginning teacher's individual or primary mentor – called the “mentor of record” – must be submitted as part of the teacher's staff file, as previously mentioned. Requiring the mentor team members to also be listed will facilitate two goals. First, the role of the mentor team members will be formalized and, therefore, perceived as important by all involved parties. Second, SDE will better understand and be able to fully analyze the types of mentoring beginning teachers are receiving. This will aid the goals of improving mentor matches and understanding what types of support are provided.

The committee supports SDE's efforts to seek input from Year Two teachers on their BEST experiences through an annual survey but believes SDE needs to make sure the information acquired from the survey results is valid and therefore useful. This goal can be reached through keeping a survey separate from the BEST assessment. The department might consider periodically collecting information from Year One teachers, as well, to better understand the support they receive and how it could be improved.

Substance of Mentoring

Lack of oversight has contributed to varying levels of mentoring across districts. The majority of Year One teachers does not receive comprehensive, substantive support from their mentors. As mentioned previously, a majority of beginning teachers (59 percent) and a larger portion of teachers in the poorest urban districts (80 percent) received either little or no substantive assistance from mentors in the following key areas mentors currently are trained to cover with their new teachers: 1) help plan lessons; 2) understand the BEST portfolio; 3) refine or learn teaching techniques; 4) made aware of program resources; and 5) understand the state's teaching standards.

No single type of substantive support was given to an overwhelming majority of Year One beginning teachers who responded to the committee's survey, as shown in Table IV-13. Most notably, only 16 percent of beginning teachers in all districts and only 8 percent of those in DRG I had mentors who helped them understand the state's teaching standards, which are the foundation of the BEST portfolio's components. The table also shows new teachers in the poorest urban districts were significantly less likely than their peers in other districts to receive each type of substantive mentoring assistance.

Year One teachers want more information that is relevant to their teaching duties. More than a third of those who responded to these survey items agreed that more relevant information in both the school or district's orientation and in the BEST orientation would have improved the support they received. About 40 percent believed support would have improved if they had received higher quality mentoring.

The committee's survey results on beginning teachers' satisfaction with the quality of mentoring are corroborated by the 2005 UConn survey, which found 23 percent of Year One and 35 percent of Year Two respondents were not satisfied with their mentors. In addition, the UConn survey analysis indicated Year One teachers who wanted guidance in particular topics often did not receive pertinent assistance. This finding was especially pronounced regarding the use of student assessment information to modify instruction – which is one of the key state standards and a BEST portfolio component – and the preparation of the portfolio. For example, 66 percent of new teachers reported wanting support on the use of student assessments to modify instruction, but less than two-thirds (62 percent) of those who wanted this sort of help, received it.⁵²

SDE has made some efforts to improve mentoring. Through EastConn, mentor trainings are reviewed and updated at least once each year, as described previously. The RESC field staff recently made available a guide for mentors, which the field staff continues to refine. The committee believes this document is a productive step toward guiding mentors. However, it is insufficient given the scope of the problem. A more structured mentoring system, based on the key elements of the state's teaching standards, would better ensure beginning teachers receive the substantive, instructional support they need. Such structured mentoring also should enhance new teachers' abilities and understanding of the BEST portfolio requirement.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should create and implement a collection of sequenced support modules, based on the state standards contained in the Connecticut Common Core of Teaching, effective teaching methods, and beginning teachers' needs, through which mentors will guide their assigned new teachers. Starting no later than the 2009-2010 school year, the department should require mentors and beginning teachers to use the module system and to submit proof of its completion to their appropriate building-level administrators. Each school district should submit annual statements to the department certifying the progress of its beginning teachers in successfully completing the mentoring requirements.

A module system of mentoring based on the state standards, addressing student learning and beginning teachers' needs, will ensure mentors understand the types of instruction and assistance they need to provide their assigned new teachers. The system simultaneously will ensure beginning teachers understand what they must learn during their initial years of teaching in Connecticut as the foundation for their careers and assist them in preparing for the state's certification assessment.

There is some national precedent for a structured mentoring program. The Pathwise system, developed by ETS, is used in several states, including Ohio, Arkansas, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Vermont. (California also has its own recommended structured mentoring curriculum.) From a review of the Pathwise materials, that system is not based on Connecticut's teaching standards and the amount of paperwork it requires seems unnecessary. The concept of structured mentoring, however, must be implemented in a way suited to this state, in order to substantially improve mentoring across and within districts.

In developing the modules, SDE is encouraged to work with the RESC field staff, along with other constituencies as determined by the department. Each module should be focused on one topic (e.g., “Planning a Unit”) and include key concepts and practices the beginning teacher must learn. With the conclusion of each module, beginning teachers should produce some evidence of their learning for review by the mentor and building administrator. Examples of evidence could include: a short reflection paper; a brief write-up of lessons learned at a relevant professional development workshop or other seminar, and how the teacher will apply those lessons; a research paper; or any other activity as determined by SDE. This evidence of learning should show the new teacher has received instruction, has reflected on it, and understands how to apply the acquired knowledge to his or her own teaching.

The purpose of the building-level administrator review of the evidence's completion, authenticity, and content is three-fold. First, the review will ensure the beginning teacher appropriately and thoughtfully completed the mentoring modules. Second, the review will require administrators to take an active role in overseeing support to beginning teachers. Third, the information could be used within the beginning teacher's performance evaluation and professional development plan.

Time for Mentoring

There is general consensus among researchers and educators that high-quality mentoring requires a substantial time commitment by mentors. In studies, the programs that show the best results are those that reduce the classroom teaching duties of mentors in part or completely. Alaska's new support program and several districts – including, most recently, New York City – have these policies.

Anecdotal information suggests some of the best mentor prospects in Connecticut decline to mentor due to time constraints caused by their teaching workload and other school-based activities. Many potential mentors are considered leaders in their schools, who typically serve on multiple committees, lead extra-curricular activities, and teach full-time. Reducing a mentor's classroom workload would give the mentor time to observe, meet with, and guide the beginning teacher. Numerous constituencies in Connecticut agree, and written testimony corroborates the belief, that giving trained veteran teachers sufficient time to mentor would both increase the quality of mentoring and boost the supply of willing mentors.

Currently, mentors are required only to receive periodic release time from classroom teaching duties. Formal release time for mentors and beginning teachers is required by law, but it is neither uniformly described within SDE documents nor consistently applied among districts that have release time policies. There is inconsistency among the state regulations, internal policies and procedures, and BEST program publications regarding the amount of release time from classroom duties mentors should receive and the activities for which release time may be used, as noted earlier. All sources are consistent, however, in that the total release time for mentors and beginning teachers, combined, must equal four days and be used, at least in part, for observations.

Information from interviews conducted during this study indicates some mentors do not or cannot take advantage of the mandated release time. Mentors generally are hesitant to take advantage of the required release time to work with beginning teachers, in part because they do not want their students to lose learning time, as many believe happens when substitute teachers fill in. In some areas, mentors are not offered release time due to a shortage of either substitute teachers or district funding to pay for them.

Data from the committee's survey of Year One teachers shows a need to give mentors time to facilitate interactions with beginning teachers. Over half (52 percent) of Year One respondents never were observed by their mentors, an activity that is required by the state regulations. On a more basic level, more than one-quarter (26 percent) of Year One respondents who had co-curricular duties were unable to find common time to meet with their mentors.⁵³

The committee's survey of district facilitators shows the inconsistency of release time policies across school districts. A strong majority (86 percent) of facilitators reported their districts allow mentors and beginning teachers to observe each other; less (61 percent) stated their districts allow release time to be used for mentoring meetings. A small percentage (7 percent) reported their districts provide time for mentors to use productively as they wish. Although release time is allowed by nearly all (94 percent) districts of the respondents, less than half (46 percent) have a formal policy of granting BEST release time to either mentors or beginning teachers.

Reducing mentors' classroom teaching workloads would provide them with dedicated time to observe and work with beginning teachers on implementing the structured support modules recommended above. In addition, the need for release time, and the inconsistencies in applying release time across districts, would be eliminated.

Because mentoring is a formal function of the BEST program, the state should assist districts with a portion of the costs associated with mentoring. At the same time, districts should be expected to provide some funding since districts benefit from strong mentoring, due to improved retention and effectiveness of beginning teachers, as national research has found.

The program review committee recommends C.G.S. Sec. 10-220a shall be amended to require a reduced classroom teaching workload for BEST mentors as determined by the school district. Those mentors who simultaneously teach part-time must have a substantially lower caseload. The workload reduction shall be structured to coincide with a beginning teacher's daily preparation time. Districts may choose to provide full-time mentors instead of, or in combination with, mentors who have a reduced classroom teaching workload. Districts shall be required not to exceed a caseload of 15 beginning teachers per full-time mentor.

The state shall provide funds to districts to reduce their costs of: 1) hiring additional personnel to fill classes for mentors who are currently employed as teachers; and/or 2) the salary or hourly wages for those educators hired solely to be mentors. Mentors who are employed simultaneously in another capacity shall receive their same salary.

The committee recommends C.G.S. Sec. 10-220a shall be amended to allow not only current teachers, but also retired teachers, retired administrators, teachers on leave, and education faculty from the state's various colleges and universities to become mentors.

The committee recommends the State Department of Education should work collaboratively with local school districts, Regional Educational Service Centers, and other constituencies associated with BEST to identify, recruit, and train an expanded pool of mentors.

SDE is encouraged to reach out to organizations, districts, and state(s) that have implemented or advocated for a reduced classroom teaching workload for mentors in order to formulate the details of the state's new policy. Their knowledge and experience can help SDE formulate a feasible and effective policy.

The program review committee believes a wide range of educators have the potential to become high-quality mentors. This belief was shared by the 2005-06 BEST Advisory Committee and by program staff and administrators in interviews. The proposed changes above will allow districts to draw on the expertise of approved current and retired educators, filling the need for mentors, and helping build a larger mentor pool.

The committee recognizes this policy change will require a fiscal commitment to mentoring that will need to be fully determined as the program is developed. Sharing the cost between the state and district levels will not reduce the overall amount of resources needed to implement a reduced classroom teaching workload for mentors. The committee believes the investment in a stronger mentoring system will result in more consistent benefits for beginning teachers, mentors, and students – with the goal of cost-savings through lower attrition and improved student achievement – than the current policy. A model of reduced or no classroom teaching duties for mentors will fully ensure mentors and beginning teachers have the time together needed to engage in substantive mentoring.

Release time. Under the new reduced classroom teaching mentor model discussed above, state-mandated release time for mentors no longer will be necessary. If the legislature decides not to implement and fund a policy of a reduced classroom workload for mentors, then release time policies should be changed so they are more consistent across the state, with accompanying state funding and monitoring.

Mentor release time is required by regulation, but is not uniformly offered by school districts, as described above. Ensuring release time is given and used would be critical to improving the quality and consistency of mentoring, in the absence of a new policy of reduced classroom teaching duties for mentors. A standardized amount of release time should be available to all mentors, in every district. In addition, mentors should receive a clear message that they are expected to use the release time to observe their new teachers, as required by law. With a policy of release time should come state funding to help districts offset costs associated with providing release time for BEST mentors.

Release time for beginning teachers to engage in induction-related activities is part of the overall release time requirement. The committee survey data, however, revealed 16 percent of Year One teachers received no release time, and an additional 16 percent received release time only once or twice. Beginning teachers specifically are required by law to observe their mentors or other teachers; over one-third (35 percent) of Year One teachers did not observe anyone, as determined by cross-referencing survey responses. Release time received for specific BEST activities is depicted in Table IV-14.

Similarly to release time for mentors, release time for new teachers should be available to all, across all districts. This will ensure beginning teachers have equal opportunity to learn from their mentors and colleagues.

Frequency of Mentoring

The guidelines regarding how frequently mentoring should occur differ across state resources and school districts. State regulations require weekly meetings, which are also recommended in the manual for BEST district-level personnel. Several other program publications recommend biweekly meetings, as described earlier in this chapter. This inconsistency has led to confusion at the district level, reflected in district facilitator survey results portrayed in Table IV-15. Mentoring support cannot be fully implemented across and within districts without consistent guidelines.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should standardize the frequency with which beginning teachers and their mentors/mentor teams are required to meet. The standard should take into consideration the frequency necessary to enable mentors and beginning teachers to successfully complete the mentoring module system recommended above.

Length of Mentoring

The duration of mentoring also varies at the district level. Many school districts already provide two years of mentoring, although there is not consistency statewide. Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of the district facilitator survey respondents indicated second-year mentoring currently was required in their districts; an additional 16 percent noted such support was strongly recommended. These results were corroborated by the committee's beginning teacher survey responses: 83 percent of all Year Two teachers – but only 61 percent of those in the poorest urban districts – received mentoring in their second years. Beginning teachers without the benefit of a second year of formal mentoring, particularly in the DRG I districts, may be at a disadvantage in building their skills.

Mentoring support in the second year is strongly desired by beginning teachers and district facilitators. Eighty-nine and 93 percent of first and second year teachers who responded to the survey, respectively, believe mentoring should last at least two years. Nearly all (96 percent) district facilitators surveyed agree.

Initial national research indicates beginning teachers and their students greatly benefit from more than one year of substantive mentoring. The cost-benefit study cited earlier, which found substantial benefits to intensive support, was based on a two-year mentoring program. Another study, which examined three districts with varying levels of Year Two mentoring, found that the students of teachers who had more intensive Year Two mentoring had higher achievement test gains over the course of that second year.⁵⁴

The program review committee recommends C.G.S. Sec. 10-220a shall be amended to require beginning teachers to receive formal mentoring during their first two years in the BEST program upon receipt of their state initial teacher certification.

This recommendation recognizes and codifies the current policies and practices of the vast majority of school districts, and will help ensure basic consistency in mentoring support across the state. Further, in accordance with this recommendation, the mentoring module system recommended earlier should cover two years of teaching. There also is precedent for requiring two years of mentoring in Connecticut: it is mandated for both ARC graduates and those teaching under Durational Shortage Area Permits.

Selection and Supply of Mentors

The process and ease of selecting teachers to become mentors varies across districts. The process of selecting mentors is outlined in state regulations. A BEST district committee is to review and recommend mentor nominees, who are then approved by the local school board. Only 30 percent of the BEST facilitators who responded to the survey use district committees for this role. Instead, generally the district facilitators or their delegates are heavily involved in both recruiting and selecting mentors. About half of facilitators reported that principals also are involved in the process.

Recruiting quality mentors is difficult in some districts, although not for most. About one in four (24 percent) BEST facilitators reported they have trouble recruiting a sufficient number of mentors. Data provided by EastConn on the numbers of beginning teachers and recently trained mentors⁵⁵ in each district indicate about 18 percent of districts experienced mentor recruitment or matching difficulty last school year.⁵⁶

Another indicator of recruitment is the precision of a mentor-beginning teacher match. Twenty-eight percent of Year One teachers were assigned either no mentor or to a mentor in neither their school nor content area, according to EastConn's mentor match data. By this measure, too, some districts are experiencing difficulty in recruiting mentors. Drawing on a larger pool of mentors, as recommended above, while having an approval process to ensure quality, may alleviate mentor recruitment difficulty.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should develop guidelines requiring any potential mentor to first be approved by: 1) his or her current district, for those who are employed, certified teachers; 2) his or her last school district, for those who are retired certified administrators or retired certified teachers; or 3) his or her current supervisor, for those who are employed as university professors specializing in education, or his or her former supervisor, for retired university professors specializing in education.

The person who actually assigns mentors to beginning teachers varies across districts. About three-quarters of district facilitators reported principals played some role in mentor matching. Overall, one-third of matches were completed solely by principals. In 21 percent of respondents' districts, however, district facilitators alone matched mentors to beginning teachers. A few districts delegated the task to department chairs and deputy superintendents.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should require the beginning teacher's building-level administrator to assign mentors and, where necessary, mentor team members.

The building-level administrators, as the beginning teachers' ultimate supervisors, should have the best understanding of which mentors would be best for the new teachers. Furthermore, placing the responsibility of mentor matching on administrators will obligate them to become more involved in the BEST program. If mentors or mentor team members with content or grade level expertise cannot be located within the beginning teachers' buildings, the administrators should be responsible for working with personnel in other schools or at the district level to find appropriate mentor team members.

Training for Mentors

All educators selected to be mentors are required to complete a three-day initial mentor training in order to be assigned to beginning teachers. Currently, mentors only need to complete initial training once; additional training every four years is recommended but not required, as previously discussed.

EastConn, at its own initiative, analyzed the limited SDE mentor match data to which it had access, for this study. The data on mentors for the 2006-07 school year reveal that many lacked recent training. A majority of those who were still teaching and considered eligible mentors (59 percent) had not been trained within the last four years, as mentioned earlier. Over one-third (35 percent) of this group, which represented 20 percent of all eligible mentors, had not attended initial or update mentor training since 1997-1998, about ten years ago. In other words, one-fifth of all mentors had not been trained since before the portfolio was implemented and the state's current teaching standards were adopted.

There is general consensus that all beginning teachers should be mentored by recently trained mentors. Beginning teachers should not be mentored by teachers who are unfamiliar with the state's teaching standards, or with the current BEST support or assessment methods.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should adopt the following mentor training requirements: 1) mentors who received initial or update mentor training up to three years ago must complete an update training; 2) mentors who received initial or update training more than three years ago must complete an initial mentor training; 3) all mentors should be required to complete a mentor update training every third year since their last initial or update training; 4) all mentor trainings, initial or update, should be provided by the State Department of Education in conjunction with the Regional Educational Service Centers, and should be focused on instructing mentors in how to work through the new mentor module system (as recommended above); and 5) anyone who fails to complete these training requirements no longer will be considered eligible for assignment to a beginning teacher, until another initial mentor training is completed.

The program review committee believes full implementation of the mentor module system will require all mentors to receive substantial instruction in the system. At the same time, the training should not be so lengthy as to become a burden to either mentors or trainers. SDE is encouraged to offer training in a series over multiple days, if necessary.

In developing the new update and initial mentor trainings, the department and the RESCs are encouraged to work closely together to ensure the trainings are based on developing mentors' coaching skills. The trainings also should instruct mentors in how to sufficiently work through the mentor module system.

Mentor-Beginning Teacher Matches

The overall quality of mentor-beginning teacher matches varies among and within districts. As previously described, some districts and content areas have an insufficient supply of trained mentors to work with beginning teachers. Due to this shortage, mentors are assigned to beginning teachers in different content areas or buildings, which may not be the most beneficial or effective matches. There are differences, however, at the district level regarding which characteristic takes precedence when a mentor of the same content area and building is not available, according to the results of the district facilitator survey. State law does not clearly define whether mentor assignments must based on a new teacher's content area, grade level, or building.

Based on available mentor data from EastConn, presented in Table IV-16, half of beginning teachers who were assigned mentors had mentors in the same content area and building. When a content match was not available within the school, beginning teachers most often were assigned to a mentor from a different content area, in the same building.

The committee's beginning teacher survey results further confirmed the variation in mentor matches and district personnel's preference for a same-building match. The survey results also indicated mentor teams did not give new teachers better total matches. The percent of new teachers whose teams contained at least one member of the same content area, grade, and building, was about the same as the percent of new teachers with an individual mentor who matched on all three characteristics.

The program review committee recommends C.G.S. Sec. 10-220a shall be amended to require each beginning teacher to be supported by a mentor or mentor team member who has recent experience or expertise in either: 1) the same, precise content area as the beginning teacher, for a new teacher not in elementary education; or 2) the same, precise grade level as the beginning teacher, for a new teacher who teaches elementary education. If such a match is not feasible, the beginning teacher shall be supported by a mentor who has recent experience or expertise in: 1) a similar content area, for a new teacher not in elementary education; or 2) a similar grade level, for a new teacher who teaches elementary education.

The committee believes a strong mentor understands how to coach a beginning teacher in applying the foundational skills of effective teaching outlined in the state standards: planning, instructing, assessing, and reflecting. At the same time, the committee recognizes that how these skills are implemented is different between, for example, a middle school science class and a high school civics class. Similarly, instructional techniques can vary within a general content area, depending on the precise subject and grade. This is especially true for elementary education, where a first grade teacher will use different teaching techniques from a fifth grade educator. The recommendation proposed above will enable beginning teachers to get support from both well-trained mentors in similar content areas, and colleagues in the more precise areas. As a result, beginning teachers will experience more beneficial mentoring and mentor matching will be facilitated.

District Facilitators

District facilitators are in charge of implementing the BEST program at the local level. About half (57 percent) of survey respondents are district-level administrators, mostly focused on curriculum; the remainder is nearly evenly split between teachers (16 percent) and principals (20 percent). Few facilitators (5 percent) only have BEST facilitator duties. Using survey questions regarding median hours worked on BEST and other duties, facilitators spend about 6 percent of their overall working time on the program.

The BEST duties performed by veteran district facilitators are not uniform across districts, with some facilitators taking very active roles and others not.⁵⁷ Nearly all district facilitators perform basic, required duties, including organizing a BEST orientation for new teachers and making sure each Year One teacher has an assigned mentor. However, beyond these duties, there is wide variation in tasks, as shown by Table IV-17. It is possible the size of districts and numbers of beginning teachers may impact the BEST activity levels of district facilitators.

On average, district facilitators performed 9.5 BEST-related duties, of the 14 common duties listed on the survey. The number of activities ranged from three to 15 (an option was provided to fill in other duties), with one-quarter of facilitators completing seven or fewer. Those who completed relatively few BEST activities may have been fulfilling the primary requirements of the facilitator position. Essentially these requirements are to ensure beginning teachers have mentors, check that mentoring is occurring, and organize a BEST orientation.

The variation in facilitator activities contributes to de facto differences in the support resources beginning teachers may access. It also likely contributes to differences in how helpful beginning teachers believe the facilitators are. Beginning teachers in a district whose facilitator checks to ensure mentoring is being provided and organizes beginning teacher meetings have more opportunities for support than those in a district whose facilitator perceives the primary duty as assigning a mentor to a beginning teacher. About half of all beginning teachers (48 and 56 percent for Years One and Two teachers, respectively) were satisfied with their facilitators.

The differences in district facilitator performance are partially caused and perpetuated by a lack of clear guidance from SDE. There is no organized training to familiarize facilitators with their duties. The vast majority of the facilitators (84 percent) who responded to the survey believe training would be beneficial. District facilitators receive three types of guidance currently, as previously mentioned. First, they meet as a group, twice a year, but it is unclear to what extent those meetings provide specific guidance on what activities they should be performing. Second, they receive a manual for the position, which is a good resource, but does not sufficiently stand in for initial training. Third, starting this year, RESC field staff is contacting all facilitators to better understand each district's induction activities and to provide additional guidance. The committee believes training will provide guidance that better enables BEST facilitators to understand their duties so beginning teachers in their districts receive sufficient assistance.

The program review committee recommends the State Department of Education should offer district facilitators training to enable them to understand and carry out their full scope of BEST duties. The department should work with the Regional Educational Service Centers in developing and offering the training.

Administrators

There is general consensus among constituencies interviewed during this study and testimony received by the committee that the quality of mentoring and overall level of support given to beginning teachers depends in large part on administrators. District and building administrators have great influence in determining the extent support is facilitated through crafting beginning teacher and mentor schedules, deciding whether to positively recognize mentors, and shaping school culture. Administrators also decide whether to personally support beginning teachers through meeting with them, making them feel comfortable in approaching with questions, offering an orientation, and facilitating attendance at workshops.

The importance of administrators to induction is corroborated by survey results. All BEST district facilitators who responded to the committee's survey agree administrators have a “strong” (74 percent) or “moderate” (26 percent) impact on the level of support provided to beginning teachers; none believed administrators do not affect overall support.

National research has confirmed administrators play a large role in teacher satisfaction levels and employment decisions. Dissatisfied teachers cite poor administrative support as their top complaint, according to the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future.⁵⁸ Similarly, teachers who change schools reported administrator support as one of their key reasons for leaving, second only to receiving a better teaching assignment.

SDE began to recognize the important role administrators play in induction and teacher satisfaction in the early 2000s. In response, the department developed and launched specific trainings a few years ago. The “Administrator Institute” and “New Teacher Induction: A Principal's Role” workshops have had at least 541 total attendees, respectively, over the years. For context, there are about 3,500 administrators in Connecticut.⁵⁹ In addition to offering trainings, the RESC staff wrote and disseminated a guide for administrators that summarized key points of the trainings, described earlier in this chapter.

Although administrator support for new teacher induction has risen, not all administrators are providing or facilitating sufficient support. RESC field staff, administrators, and mentors generally agree that attention some administrators give to induction is not at expected levels.

These impressions are confirmed by the committee's survey data, which provide information on beginning teachers' satisfaction with their principals and district-level recognition of mentors. A significant portion of beginning teachers was either “dissatisfied” with or received “no support” from their principals. Year Two respondents were about equally dissatisfied with (18 percent) and more frequently received no support from (23 percent) their principals, compared to Year One respondents (21 and 11 percent, respectively). Principals were not generally a source of support for Year Two teachers who lacked mentors; they gave assistance to only 12 percent of those teachers. In comparison, 29 percent of Year Two teachers without mentors reported receiving support from the BEST district facilitator. It is unclear why Year Two respondents were less satisfied with principal support. For new teachers at both stages, however, principal support varied by DRG, with those in wealthier districts receiving more support. Interestingly, those beginning teachers who were satisfied (or not) with their principals were also satisfied (or not) with their mentors and other teacher colleagues, a result which could support the hypothesis that principals can influence the overall level of support.

The support district-level administrators choose to give mentors through recognition also varies. A portion of districts gives financial compensation to mentors, outside the collective bargaining agreements, as previously mentioned. Approximately half the districts that do not give stipends to mentors recognize mentors in other ways, such as giving them a reception or formally recognizing them at a local board of education meeting. About 13 percent of districts do not formally recognize mentors in any way, according to the district facilitator survey results.

Department and RESC staff, administrators, mentors, and beginning teachers noted in discussions with committee staff that some administrators continue to be unaware of the importance of supporting new teacher induction or of how to provide support. Administrators are not obligated to complete training in how to support new teacher induction. There is precedent for requiring administrators to complete a certain type of training. Like teachers, administrators must earn a certain number of professional development credits every five years to retain certification. At least 15 of the required 90 hours must be in teacher evaluation, yet there is no requirement for any type of training in how to support new teachers.

The program review committee recommends C.G.S. Sec. 10-145b(l)(1) shall be amended to require administrators acting in an administrative or supervisory capacity at least 50 percent of their assigned time to complete a certain number of hours of training, as determined by the State Department of Education, in new teacher induction during each five-year certification period.

This requirement will compel all administrators to recognize the importance of new teacher induction and the trainings will instruct them in concrete ways to support beginning teachers. Building administrator review and approval of the mentor modules also will improve administrators' understanding of and involvement in support.

Chapter Five: Assessment

Beginning teachers in Connecticut are required to submit a teaching portfolio near the end of their second year of participation in the BEST program, under most circumstances. The portfolio is specific to a beginning teacher's content area, as determined by the state certification endorsement obtained under the teacher's Initial Certification. The purpose of the BEST portfolio is to assess a beginning teacher's knowledge and application of the general and content-specific standards contained in the Connecticut Common Core of Teaching. The committee's findings and recommendations regarding the BEST assessment are provided in this chapter.

Description

Portfolio Contents

The BEST portfolio is a structured, multi-part document developed by the beginning teacher around one unit of classroom instruction. Although there are certain portfolio requirements specific to each of the 10 subject areas, the general framework and contents of a portfolio are the same. The actual requirements of, and process for, completing a portfolio are detailed in the content area handbooks that beginning teachers receive as part of their participation in BEST.

Table V-1 highlights the general structure of a portfolio. Specifically, teachers are asked to: 1) organize a unit of instruction around an essential concept in a series of lessons; 2) engage students in exploring that essential concept in a series of lessons; 3) assess student learning and use this assessment to adjust future instruction; and 4) reflect on their students' learning, the quality of students' learning, and the quality of their own teaching. Within the BEST program, this process is known as the cycle of effective teaching. The actual contents of the portfolio include:

The unit of instruction used in the portfolio is typically five to eight hours of classroom time. The full written portion of the portfolio generally is up to 70 pages. Roughly 20 pages are teacher commentaries while the remainder are supporting documents, including student work, daily logs, and lesson plans. The video component of the portfolio is usually a 15- to 20-minute segment of the teacher's classroom instruction.

Beginning teachers are provided with the general BEST Guide handbook and individual content area handbooks based on the subject(s) they are certified to teach. The content area handbooks detail the requirements for each of the four sections of the portfolio: planning, instruction, assessment, and self-reflection. The content handbooks also provide suggestions for teachers regarding what evidence assessors will look for when scoring the portfolio. Although there are individual requirements within each of the 10 content areas that are unique to that subject, the general purpose of the portfolio is the same: to ensure a beginning teachers meet the minimum competency requirements established by the state for new teachers.

Elementary education teachers. Portfolios for beginning teachers in elementary education are somewhat different than those for the other content areas. Elementary education teachers who are certified to teach both literacy (i.e., integrated language arts, developmental reading, or remedial reading/language arts) and numeracy (i.e., mathematics or remedial mathematics) are required to submit a two-part portfolio: one for literacy and one for numeracy. Both parts include the same four principle components as other portfolios, applied to each area. In essence, these teachers complete two portfolios, although the total hours of instruction documented is roughly the same as portfolios for other content areas. Elementary education teachers certified to teach only literacy or numeracy submit one portfolio for their respective subject area.

Timelines for Submitting a Portfolio

Teachers completing their first portfolios must do so by May 15 of their second year of teaching. Teachers also have the option of submitting their portfolios in the spring of their first year of teaching. To do so, formal application is required, which must be reviewed and approved by the district facilitator and the teacher's principal before being submitted to SDE for review and approval.

Different dates apply to teachers submitting a second or third portfolio, as discussed later in this chapter. Teachers electing to submit portfolios in their first year and who fail the portfolio have opportunities to submit additional portfolios, similar to second-year teachers.

Extensions. Beginning teachers may receive an extension for submitting their portfolios under certain circumstances. An extension of up to five days past the deadline may be granted by the SDE project leader for minor procedural or technical problems encountered by a teacher in completing the portfolio. No documentation is necessary from the teacher for this type of extension.

For circumstances beyond a teacher's control (e.g., family difficulties or illness), an extension may be granted until June 1 of that year for portfolios due mid-May. The request must be sent to SDE in writing either by the district facilitator or the teacher's principal. If the request involves a medical problem, a teacher may submit it directly to SDE without first obtaining district approval.

Any extension made beyond June 1 of a teacher's second year requires “extreme extenuating circumstances,” according to the BEST policy and procedures manual. Approvals for this type of request are determined by the SDE bureau chief overseeing the BEST program. The department also reserves the right to return any portfolio submitted late without the proper authorization.

Deferrals. There are times when a beginning teacher participating in BEST may have a different teaching assignment than that of the previous year, which would affect completing the portfolio. A teacher in this situation may receive permission from SDE through an application process to defer submitting his or her portfolio.

An example of this situation is when a teacher is assigned to one of the 10 portfolio content areas (e.g., science) in year one of BEST, and then is assigned to teach a different subject (e.g., math) during year two of BEST when the portfolio is due. When this occurs, the teacher is not expected to complete a portfolio for his or her new content area after only one year of teaching the subject. BEST provides an opportunity for the beginning teacher to “roll-back” submitting his or her portfolio by one year. This gives the teacher another year of teaching experience within the new content area. For teachers between their first and second years in the program, their status in BEST is considered the same as a teacher in year one in the program; between years two and three, their BEST status rolls back to year two. In other words, if a science teacher during year one in BEST is re-assigned to teach math during year two, the teacher's BEST participation reverts to year one status and he or she is not required to submit a math portfolio until after the second year of teaching of teaching that subject (which is actually their third year of participation in BEST). This is only one example of when a deferral is allowed; there are multiple scenarios warranting deferrals according to the BEST policies and procedures manual. Teachers may also roll-back their BEST status upon verification by SDE of a claim that the teacher did not receive mentoring.

One example of when a roll-back is not permitted is when elementary school teachers change grade levels within the elementary school. Teachers endorsed to teach elementary school and assigned to a different grade level than the one they taught the previous year must still fulfill BEST requirements for the elementary education portfolio as scheduled, even though they are teaching a different grade.

Exemptions. Beginning teachers may request a full or partial exemption from completing the portfolio. Those who believe their teaching assignment precludes them from meeting the portfolio's requirements may choose to ask for a full exemption. A formal application on behalf of the teacher must be submitted to SDE with signatures from the beginning teacher, principal, district facilitator, and superintendent.

Requests for an exemption are permitted only during the teacher's second or third year in the BEST program. According to BEST policies and procedures, examples of teaching assignments eligible for exemptions include pre-kindergarten, computer technology, remedial reading/language arts, and special education for students with severe or profound disabilities.

A BEST review committee within SDE is responsible for reviewing portfolio exemption requests. The committee, consisting of BEST administrators, project leaders, teachers-in-residence, and district personnel (e.g., district facilitators), notifies the beginning teacher and district facilitator (or principal) once a decision is made, which must occur within 40 days of SDE receiving the exemption request.

Elementary education beginning teachers who are certified in both literacy and numeracy but teach in only one of these areas may request a partial exemption to their portfolio requirements and submit a portfolio only for the subject they teach. A formal application is required and a review process similar to full exemption requests is conducted.

Portfolio Scoring

The overall process for scoring BEST portfolios is extensive. It involves selecting and training scorers, retraining scorers each year they score portfolios, and actually scoring portfolios. SDE has attempted to standardize the process wherever possible, and the system used to score portfolios is consistent across content areas.

Scorers

BEST portfolios are scored by various professional educators within Connecticut. Teachers and administrators from school districts throughout the state, including retired educators, and higher education faculty score portfolios. Each of the Regional Educational Service Center field staff for BEST also scores portfolios. SDE project leaders and teachers-in-residence oversee the scoring process.

Portfolio scorer candidates are recruited in various ways. District facilitators, mentors, administrators, professional colleagues, SDE program employees, RESC field staff, and personnel from teacher preparation programs throughout the state are all involved in trying to recruit educators to become portfolio scorers. Candidates also are recruited from several pools: 1) current and former SDE teachers-in-residence; 2) Connecticut teachers certified by the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards; 3) current and former state teachers-of-the-year; and 4) graduates of the BEST program who demonstrated high levels of performance on the BEST portfolio.

Requirements. Certified teachers with at least five years of recent classroom experience are eligible to become portfolio scorers upon recommendation from their districts. The recommendation is based on the teacher's professional abilities and experience within the education field and school district. School district administrators and central office personnel, as well as higher education faculty, also are eligible to be scorers. According to BEST policies and procedures, they must show they have regular contact with – and involvement in – classrooms and the appropriate content backgrounds. Portfolio scorers may only score portfolios in their respective content area(s).

An application to become a scorer must be submitted to SDE for approval by the content area project leader and Teacher-in-Residence. Prospective scorers are asked to commit to finishing the requisite training, completing proficiency testing, and attending 10 days of scoring each year they score. Prospective scorers also are expected to agree to score portfolios for at least three years out of the next five. Administrators may elect to score portfolios for only five days and make a two-year commitment to being a scorer. All portfolio scorers must sign an agreement as to the confidentiality of the portfolio training materials, scoring documents, and actual portfolios.

Training. All portfolio scorers, whether new or experienced, must complete specific training conducted by SDE. Training is provided by content area, since scorers only score portfolios in the content area for which they are certified to teach. Scorers with multiple state endorsements may choose which portfolio content area they want to score portfolios based on their current teaching assignment. Table V-2 shows the training requirements for all portfolio scorers.

Over the course of several months, typically from April to early July, all new scorers receive an orientation to portfolio scoring and four days of initial training to understand the process of scoring portfolios. Calibration training is for all scorers. This training provides scorers with “benchmark portfolios” at each rating level used in portfolio scoring (the portfolio rating scale is discussed later in this chapter).

Benchmark portfolios used during scorer training are actual portfolios from previous years that have already been scored. The SDE project leader, Teacher-in-Residence, and other selected personnel choose the benchmark portfolios for each content area prior to using them for training purposes. This vetting process is designed to ensure the score given to the benchmark portfolio appropriately reflects the portfolio and that there are relatively few, if any, ambiguities regarding the portfolio scores.

Training for portfolio scorers also includes reviewing, scoring, and discussing a portfolio considered a “cusp.” Cusp portfolios have mixed characteristics in terms of passing and non-passing performance. Scorers typically had difficulty deciding whether the portfolio should pass, resulting in multiple reads of the portfolio. This type of training is intended to provide scorers experience in handling the nuances that may occur when scoring portfolios.

SDE trains scorers to identify and avoid various biases that could surface during live scoring. The BEST portfolio scoring process is designed to be as objective as possible, although a scorer's personal judgment plays a role in the process.⁶⁰ Types of bias that may influence scorers to view a portfolio more subjectively include: a beginning teacher's writing style; a scorer's emotional reactions either to the video or portfolio contents; or the physical appearance of the portfolio. Scorers are trained to be cognizant of these and other possible sources of bias and how to avoid their influence.

As the final step in their training, scorers must undergo proficiency testing each year they want to score portfolios. This testing occurs during the summer, right before the live scoring session starts, except for scorers in science, as discussed below. Scorers are provided a benchmark portfolio for which only SDE knows the score given. For proficiency testing, experienced scorers are not permitted to score a benchmark portfolio that they actually were involved in scoring.

Prospective scorers are required to individually review the benchmark portfolio during the final training session and score it as they would during a live scoring session. In contrast to live scoring there is no interaction with SDE staff; interaction is allowed and encouraged during live scoring. The scoring documents used by each scorer are collected and reviewed by the SDE project leader, Teacher-in-Residence, and other experienced portfolio scorers as determined by SDE (discussed below). The SDE-led group grades the prospective scorers using a standardized scoring document. Prospective scorers may be graded as:

The only exception to the standard portfolio scorer training process is for science portfolio scorers. A separate Science Leadership Academy has been established to train portfolio scorers for that area. The academy is a week-long training for prospective scorers held annually in July. Instead of having the training sessions occur over several months, as other content areas do, portfolio scorer training for science is held over the five-day session.

The science academy training serves a dual purpose: it trains participants as portfolio scorers and cross-trains them as mentors. Scorers in the science content area have always been trained through the academy, and the materials and activities used during the academy have essentially remained the same since first implemented seven years ago.

A key difference in the training schedule for the science portfolio scorers and those in the other content areas is that all new science scorers who finish the Science Leadership Academy do not score portfolios until the following year. In the interim, those scorers must attend three additional days of training during the school year. They will then attend the next year's science academy to fulfill their calibration, bias training, and proficiency testing, with all the experienced scorers. Once satisfactorily completed, they are eligible to begin scoring. In the other content areas, scorers are eligible during the same year they are trained and determined proficient.

Compensation. Portfolio scorers receive a flat stipend of $100 for each portfolio scored, which has remained unchanged since the early 2000s. The compensation for other scoring personnel is $250 per day for table leaders, $275 per day for assistant site leaders, and $300 per day for site leaders. SDE also provides limited stipends for scorers during training.

For payment purposes, there is no minimum or limit to the number of portfolios one person can score. Payment for portfolio scorers is processed through EastConn. The scorers' compensation also includes meals (breakfast, lunch, and snacks) available on all training and scoring days.

Portfolio scorers also receive Continuing Education Units for their training and work as scorers. As outlined in the BEST policies and procedures, portfolio scorers can earn between 5.6 and 7.0 CEUs, depending on whether a person is a new or experienced scorer, fully completes training, and scores portfolios.

Scoring Logistics and Site Organization

Almost all of the BEST portfolios in a given year are submitted by the May 15 deadline during a teacher's second year in BEST. Teachers submitting their second portfolio (in Year 3) must do so by mid-February, and those submitting a third portfolio (also in Year 3) must meet a mid-June deadline.

All teachers submit their portfolios to EastConn by mail or in-person. EastConn serves as the BEST program's central repository and clearinghouse for portfolios. It is responsible for cataloguing and numbering all the portfolios it receives based on the content area of the portfolio and the date submitted. EastConn distributes portfolios to the individual scoring sites around the state. Upon the completion of portfolio scoring, EastConn collects the portfolios from each site and retains them for future use or reference, if necessary.

Multiple sites are used for scoring portfolios. The sites generally are public schools, although some private sites, such as Quinnipiac University, have been used. For public school sites, EastConn works with school districts to confirm the dates and times facilities are needed for portfolio scoring, and what services the district will provide. EastConn makes all arrangements for catering services at the individual scoring sites.

Individual scoring sites have a central location where portfolios are housed and distributed to scorers. Sites also have video viewing equipment for scorers to use. A computer at each site is used to monitor the distribution of portfolios and track portfolio scores. Individual scores are sent to SDE at the end of each day of scoring. The SDE project leader, or another designated staff person, is responsible for overseeing and managing the portfolio scoring operations for his or her particular content area. Portfolio scoring generally occurs over a two-week period each July.

Site organization. Scoring sites must be organized according to SDE guidelines. Figure V-1 depicts the portfolio scoring site hierarchy for each of the 10 content areas.

Each scoring site is overseen by the SDE project leader for the respective content area. For the three content areas currently without an assigned project leader (Music, Visual Arts, and World Languages) or when multiple scoring sites are simultaneously used for a particular content area, an SDE-designated staff consultant for the content area, often a Teacher-in-Residence, oversees site operations. The consultant serves as the scoring site's Chief Reader who has final authority on approving all portfolio scores and scoring documents emanating from the scoring site.

SDE project leaders are assisted by site leaders. Site leaders have general supervisory duties at the scoring site, as determined by the Project Leader, including assigning portfolios to scorers. Site leaders are responsible for reviewing portfolios and scoring documents, particularly those with multiple failing scores. Site leaders also make scoring decisions (i.e., adjudicate) when previous scorers cannot agree on what score(s) to give a portfolio. Teachers-in-residence serve as the site leaders.

Assistant site leaders provide another layer of review and oversight to the portfolio scoring process. They are responsible for assisting the SDE site team in whatever manner deemed necessary, including working with portfolio scorers and table leaders whenever questions or issues arise with a portfolio. Assistant site leaders also help prepare scoring documents for reviews by site leaders and chief readers. Assistant site leaders are experienced educators and portfolio scorers approved and trained by SDE.

The Table Leader is the first-level contact person for portfolio scorers. Table leaders are experienced educators and portfolio scorers approved and trained by SDE. Their responsibilities are varied, and include: 1) discussing concerns or issues scorers have about the scoring process or a particular portfolio; 2) working with scorers to determine the scoring rationale for portfolios; 3) checking and reviewing scoring documents for completion, accuracy, and coherence; and 4) assisting with the overall operations of the scoring site.

As the first level of support for portfolio scorers, table leaders serve an important role in the overall portfolio scoring process. They are generally assigned to oversee six to eight portfolio scorers. To be a table leader, several stages of training are involved, including one half-day of training by the SDE content area project leader. The training is devoted to learning how to conduct completion and accuracy reviews of completed scoring documents.

Along with the other scoring site team members, table leaders assist SDE in choosing benchmark portfolios for use in scorer training, which is part of the table leaders' overall training. Each year prior to portfolio scorer training, table leaders chosen by SDE individually read and score possible benchmark portfolios. The table leaders then discuss the performance of each benchmark portfolio and finalize the scoring documentation as a group, under SDE's direction. The process takes several days to complete.

Table leaders are responsible for reviewing and discussing the scoring documents for portfolio(s) used for proficiency testing, which is another level of their overall training. The process ensures each table leader derives the same score for the proficiency portfolio. Table leaders also help supervise the proficiency testing process and provide feedback to prospective scorers following proficiency testing.

Interns are used by SDE at each scoring site to enter portfolio score information into the computer program that electronically tracks such information. Interns usually are college students studying education who have been recommended by their programs to SDE.

Scoring System

The system used to score a BEST portfolio is complex and involves numerous people. SDE notes the portfolio process has become more refined over time, as has the scoring system.

Rating scale. Portfolios generally are scored using a rating scale of 1-4. As summarized in Table V-3, the individual scores correspond to: 1 (conditional), 2 (competent), 3 (proficient), and 4 (advanced). A score of 4 means the evidence of meeting the Connecticut Common Core of Teaching standards – as provided by the beginning teacher's portfolio and determined by the portfolio scoring process – is exemplary. Teachers receiving a portfolio score of “3” show consistent evidence of meeting CCT standards, while a score of “2” shows sufficient evidence. A portfolio score of “1” indicates the portfolio shows limited evidence of the teacher meeting the CCT standards. Teachers must score a “2” or higher to pass the portfolio and maintain their state teacher certification. Beginning teachers have at least two and potentially three opportunities to pass their BEST portfolio assessment without losing their certification at any point.

A portfolio may receive a zero or no score. A score of zero is given when a breach of ethics is found within the portfolio during the scoring process. Ethical violations include, among others, strong evidence the teacher falsified information or misrepresented his or her teaching. Teachers in their second year in BEST who receive a zero score are eligible for a third year if a written request by the superintendent is made and approved by the SDE commissioner. Teachers in their third year of BEST who receive a zero score are ineligible for continued certification.

There also are times when a portfolio cannot be scored, due to incomplete or inadequate portfolio documentation that interferes with the accurate and fair scoring of the portfolio. This results in a rating by the portfolio scorer of “not scorable.” Teachers in their second year of BEST are eligible for a third year, and those in their third year lose their certification and may re-apply for their certification under certain conditions, as discussed later.

Portfolio evaluation process and framework. Scorers are required to follow several fundamental steps that form the basis for the BEST portfolio scoring process. The steps are to be followed by all portfolio scorers and are the same across all content areas. The bulk of the training scorers receive is centered on understanding and refining this process. The scoring process is fully described in the content area handbooks each beginning teacher who is required to complete a portfolio receives, and is summarized below:

The analysis, evaluation, and scoring of the portfolio is based on a rubric format. The rubric is a table that identifies a set of 13 specific performance indicators that form the framework for the scorer's analysis and evaluation. The performance indicators are aligned with the Connecticut Common Core of Teaching standards and are the same across all content areas. A copy of the 2007 BEST Portfolio Performance Rubric for Social Studies is provided as reference in Appendix H.

The rubric table also outlines the BEST performance continuum based on the rating scale of 1-4. Each of the 13 performance indicators of the rubric has standardized language to describe the different teaching performance levels based on the rating scale of 1-4. Scorers apply the pattern statements they have developed from their evidence collection and analysis of the portfolio to the rubric for each performance indicator. Using the performance continuum provided in the rubric, scorers match their interpretation of the teacher's portfolio performance for a particular performance indicator with the corresponding descriptor in the performance continuum that best matches the scorer's assessment.

Scorers assign a score for each performance indicator in the rubric based on the teacher's performance in the portfolio as determined by the scorer. An overall score is arrived at by comparing the portfolio performance for each performance indicator to a performance profile that describes typical teaching performances at each rating and to comparisons with benchmark portfolio information. SDE estimates the average amount of time that a scorer spends with the initial review of one portfolio generally is between four and six hours.

Scoring protocol and review process. As mentioned earlier, like all evaluations conducted by people, the BEST portfolio scoring process involves a level of subjectivity. In this respect, the portfolio is no different from the various assessment methods used since the program was first implemented. Checks and balances within the current portfolio scoring process have been established to help ensure the process is consistent and fair. Figure V-2 outlines the portfolio scoring protocol and review process – called “back reading” – used by SDE for the 2007 summer scoring session.

The protocol outlined in the figure is a multi-level review process. Overall, the process is intended to ensure: 1) the necessary scoring documentation is completed; 2) the scorer(s) has accurately interpreted the portfolio data and integrated the identified indicator and category performance patterns into a justified portfolio score; and 3) the final score and sign-off by SDE verifies the overall accuracy of both the process and final portfolio score.

Each portfolio scored is reviewed at least three times, in some capacity, by a combination of the following people: initial scorer, table leader, assistant site leader, site leader, and project leader/chief reader. In addition to the review by the initial scorer, at least two people back read each portfolio. The extent of the back read review depends on the portfolio score, and is more involved for portfolios receiving failing or borderline passing scores. At any time during scoring, a portfolio may be assigned for a second or third blind read, which is conducted by portfolio scorers with no knowledge of any previous score given the portfolio. The time devoted to the back read review process, what the reviews entail, and who performs the reviews are summarized in Table V-4. (Note: Table V-4 is a more detailed description of the process identified in Figure V-2.)

Incident reports. Situations may occur during the scoring of an individual portfolio that could interfere with the fair evaluation of that portfolio. Examples include technical problems with the portfolio video (e.g., inaudible tape or distorted picture), omission of parts of the portfolio, portfolio directions not followed, evidence of possible violations of procedures or breach of ethics, and evidence of safety violations. SDE has a standardized process for reporting and reviewing incidents occurring during portfolio scoring. As discussed above, incidents may result in a portfolio either not being scored or, if determined egregious, being issued a score of zero.

Portfolio scorers are encouraged to make a significant effort to score every portfolio. In the event of an unusable video, SDE's policy is to attempt contacting the beginning teacher to determine if an immediate replacement video is available.

SDE requires all beginning teachers to submit a letter of authenticity signed also by their principals with the complete portfolio. The letter attests to certain conditions, including that the material submitted with the portfolio is not misrepresented or falsified in any way and the principal has reviewed the portfolio for its completeness and authenticity.

Score results and feedback. Altogether, scoring and distribution of the results takes a little over three months to complete. Portfolio results are generally available to teachers by the beginning of September for portfolios submitted in May. Superintendents also receive a list of all beginning teachers in their districts and their portfolio scores. District facilitators receive lists of only teachers who passed their portfolios, although the lists do not include teacher scores. Teachers may view their results on line using the BEST Connections website, in addition to receiving the results by mail.

SDE has developed an automated system that creates a feedback report to accompany portfolio results. The system uses information from the actual rubric statements to create the report. The feedback report includes information about the teacher's topic and then gives the pattern statements for each performance indicator within the rubric.

The department piloted a more detailed feedback response several years ago that provided individual examples as back-up information to the rubric statements. The process, however, was determined too time-consuming because it involved a detailed editing process necessary to specifically tailor supporting rubric information with individual feedback letters and ensure the feedback was written adequately well.

Failing a portfolio. Teachers who submit their portfolios at the end of their second year participating in BEST and receive a score of “1,” may submit a second portfolio during their third year in BEST. The second portfolio must be submitted by the following February 1. If the teacher receives another failing score, which is determined by April, he or she is eligible to submit a third portfolio. This, however, is only permitted at the written request of the teacher's superintendent, partially due to the potential hiring implications.

Third portfolios must be submitted by May 15 of a teacher's third year in the BEST program. Scores for all third portfolios are sent to beginning teachers and their superintendents by mid-August. This is to allow the district to make hiring adjustments if the teacher fails a third time and is no longer certified to teach in Connecticut.

Teachers not fulfilling the BEST requirements after a full three years in the program, either due to failing their portfolio or not submitting a portfolio, are eligible to qualify for re-issuance of their certification under certain conditions. For this to occur, teachers must apply to SDE for the “Intervening Study and Experience” status within BEST, which is a process that must be completed before a teacher's certification is re-issued. This process requires a teacher to:

SDE will consider reinstating a beginning teacher's initial certification only upon satisfactory fulfillment of the above plans. The teacher must then re-enter the BEST program as a first year beginning teacher, and submit a portfolio in the following (second) year.

Portfolio Assessment Conference. Teachers who receive failing scores on either their first or second portfolios are eligible to participate in individual Portfolio Assessment Conferences (PACs). The PAC is an in-person meeting with a portfolio scorer (not the beginning teacher's actual portfolio scorer), often a table leader, who helps the teacher interpret his or her portfolio results. PACs are scheduled through EastConn at the locations and times established by the SDE project leaders. Attendance at a PAC is voluntary on the part of the teacher. The state education department notes several attempts are made to contact a teacher regarding the availability of the assessment conference.

The Portfolio Assessment Conference is not a formal appeals process for BEST portfolio scores. Teachers wanting to appeal their scores must do so through the appeals process developed within SDE for state teaching certifications. This process is used infrequently. Moreover, there has only been one legal challenge to the overall validity and reliability of the portfolio process, but the challenge was dropped early in the legal process, with no ramification for the BEST program.

Portfolio Resources for Beginning Teachers

There are several resources available to beginning teachers to assist them in developing their portfolios. As mentioned throughout this report, BEST websites designed to help beginning teachers have been developed by SDE and EastConn, and there are handbooks, training, and resource personnel at the district and state levels.

Beginning teachers and table leaders also have access to examples of portfolios that are considered outstanding by SDE (i.e., received a score of “4”). These portfolios, called “exemplars,” are available online and hard copies are available for review at each RESC. School districts also have the option of purchasing copies of exemplar portfolios to have on-site for their teachers. New exemplar portfolios are introduced every year for each content area.

Portfolio Data

BEST portfolio data were collected from SDE, and highlighted below. This includes statistics on portfolio submissions, exemptions, and outcomes. Information was collected about beginning teachers who submit portfolios, portfolio scores, and teacher contract provisions regarding release time for beginning teachers to complete portfolios, and stipends for portfolio scorers.

Beginning Teachers Submitting First Portfolios

Figure V-3 shows the changes in the number of teachers submitting first portfolios from school years 1999-00 through 2006-07. Implementation of the portfolio requirement was phased in between 1999-00 and 2005-06 for the 10 content areas, with most of the increase occurring in the early 2000s. The increases in the numbers of beginning teachers submitting portfolios in SY 01-02 and SY 05-06 correspond with the portfolio requirement added for the visual arts and world languages content areas.

Demographic Data

Table V-5 highlights selected demographic data for beginning teachers submitting their first portfolios in school years 2004-05 through 2006-07. The table shows portfolios by content area, demographic group, gender, and school level. In summary, the table conveys most beginning teachers submitting their first portfolios over the three-year period were elementary school teachers, white, and female. In each of the three years, between 36 percent and 40 percent of the portfolios submitted were in the elementary education field, followed by teachers in special education and English language arts. In terms of race, the vast majority of beginning teachers were white, accounting for over 91 percent in each year. Roughly three-quarters of the beginning teachers submitting their first portfolios in each year were female.

Portfolio Exemptions

Table V-6 shows full and partial BEST portfolio exemption information for 2006-07 (see exemption explanation on page 78.) A total of 127 (6 percent) of the 1,948 beginning teachers supposed to submit a BEST portfolio were exempted from the process. Sixty-three (3 percent) elementary education teachers received partial exemptions. The table shows the exemptions, including for literacy and numeracy portfolios.

Portfolio Scores

The distribution of portfolio scores for May 2007 is shown in Table V-7. The information is for beginning teachers submitting their first portfolio. As the table shows, almost six out of every ten beginning teachers submitting their first portfolios in 2007 scored a “2” (competent), and another 27 percent scored a “3” (proficient). Three percent of beginning teachers' portfolios were scored a “4” (exemplary), while 11 percent scored a “1” (conditional).

Portfolio Assessment Conferences

As discussed earlier, beginning teachers failing their portfolios are provided the opportunity to attend an individual Portfolio Assessment Conference (PAC) to meet with SDE-designated staff to discuss their portfolio scores. Of the 269 teachers receiving a portfolio score of “1” in SY 2005-06, portfolio assessment conferences were held for 218 teachers (81 percent).

Portfolio Scorers

Table V-8 shows the number of new and experienced portfolio scorers for SYs 2003-04 through 2006-07. Scorers new to the portfolio scoring process received scorer training that year; science portfolio scorers received their training the previous year through the Science Leadership Academy. Regardless of when scorers are trained, they must participate in benchmark portfolio training and be deemed proficient by SDE for each year they score portfolios. As the table shows, in each of the four years new scorers accounted for roughly 40 percent of all scorers, while about 60 percent were experienced scorers.