The following is a list of recent resources for those focused on the professional improvement of teachers, principals, and other educational leaders.

Teachers: Get Involved in ESSA: The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and goes into effect this year, will help our schools gain momentum. In a letter released this week from U.S. Secretary of Education John King, he says that “ESSA provides the opportunity for educators to have new flexibility to allow for innovation and to accommodate local needs, but we must ensure that, whatever we do, we’re addressing the needs of all students.” He also encourages educators to find ways to get involved and provide input to ensure that their state’s plan reflects expertise from the classroom and school levels.

A Coming Crisis in Teaching? Teacher Supply, Demand, and Shortages in the U.S. Teacher shortages are particularly severe in special education, mathematics, science, and bilingual/English learner education, and in locations with lower wages and poorer working conditions. Shortages are projected to grow based on declines in teacher education enrollments, coupled with student enrollment growth, efforts to reduce pupil-teacher ratios, and ongoing high attrition rates. If attrition were reduced by half to rates comparable to those in high-achieving nations, shortages would largely disappear. The authors present policy options designed to address the shortage by expanding the supply of qualified teachers and improving retention, especially in hard-to-staff schools. (Source: Learning Policy Institute) 

Northwestern’s Educational Coaching Network’s Fall and Winter Series is a set of sessions that focus on the themes of “Enhancing Your Coaching Cycle” and “Growth and Effectiveness of a Coaching Program.” This will be a practical, hands-on series where coaches can share their stories, practice their craft, network with each other, and interact with established authors in the coaching field. It will also be an opportunity for coaches to evaluate their coaching and decide what “the next level” is for them and how to get there.

Do You Have the Strength to Teach? In HelpReaders’s YouTube video, Spartan school leaders question if 300 prospective teachers have what it takes to enter the battleground of education. What does it take to be an elementary school teacher? The Spartan principal can tell you, and you can decide if you have what it takes to make it in the education arena.

How Do We Stop the Exodus of Minority Teachers?
 Researchers examined trends in minority teacher recruitment and retention over 25 years and found that the number of Hispanic, black, Asian and Native American teachers has more than doubled since 1987, which is twice the rate of growth for white, non-Hispanic teachers. (Hechinger Report, Sept. 14)

Solving Teacher Shortages. This week, the Learning Policy Institute released a comprehensive analysis of teacher supply, demand and growing shortages in the U.S.—Solving Teacher Shortages: Attracting and Retaining a Talented and Diverse Teaching Force. It includes a 50-state interactive map that provides numeric ratings on the conditions in each state that influence the supply of teachers. The impact of the teacher shortage on students will be schools having to cancel courses, increase class sizes and and teacher pupil ratios, or hire underprepared teachers (Heim, Washington Post).

IN Might Pay for Teachers to Go Back To School to Save Dual Credit Program.
 A top Indiana lawmaker says the state is willing to spend thousands of dollars to help schools across the state continue to offer dual credit courses. The popular classes, which let high school students earn college credits, have been put in jeopardy by new rules that, by 2017, will require all teachers of dual credit classes to have a master’s degree or 18 graduate credits in their subject area. (Chalkbeat, Sept. 21)