Teacher Question? National Board Certification

There was a article in the Clayton News-Star this week about a former Clayton resident receiving National Board Certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards.
1) Are there statistics on the percentage of teachers that are National Board Certified?
2) Any posters on 4042 Discussion Board that are National Board Certified teachers?
3) Any of your kid's teachers National Board Certified?
Just wondering if this is a big deal or not. The article indicated that North Carolina teachers who become National Board Certified are awarded with a 12 % salary increase in addition to paying for the $2,300 cost of the assessment.
A 12% salary increase is pretty substancial. Does the county pay the increased salary or does the state pay the differene every year.

 

I don't have the answers to any of your questions, but my son's teacher last year was going for her National Certification, I've posted before about how wonderful she was. She did get it and the notice was in the paper on the 28th. If we the taxpayers foot the increase, I've got no problem with it, well worth it in my opinion. My experience this year has not been quite so glowing.

 

One thing I do know that NC has the highest number of Board certified teachers, but they push the program. they don't push it so heavily in other states. Where I come from , the districts are more likely to pay to help get your Masters.

 

Being Board Certified is a huge deal...we have a lot of teachers who are members at my church and several are B.C....it is a LOT of work, very time-consuming and they really do have to earn it, it's not a benefit of District politics. I think it's a really good way to ensure that the teacher is a quality one.

 

National Board Certification is the brainchild of the public education machine, in essence big government doing what it does best - totally missing the point and creating huge inefficiencies. Is it a big deal? Of course it is to the erudites in the lofty towers of public education. Is it a big deal for the students in North Carolina? Hardly.

The process **attempts** to identify traits in teachers who have high student achievement, and then train other teachers to copy those traits. The teachers who can remember the government's recipe can pass the certification process, so many teachers go to seminars specifically to learn the recipe for the test. Why don't we scrap the recipe created by government eggheads and just identify those teachers who have higher student improvement scores? Wouldn't that make more sense? As it stands now you have teachers who pass the test making 12% more, while a teacher right next door may have made straight A's in college and gets better student achievement results but couldn't pass the test and is stuck with the same salary. Those situations foster resentment and lower teacher morale and they are not uncommon.

And what about the traits that the National Board process does not consider? If a new teacher passes, but another teacher with 15 years experience doesn't, does that mean the new teacher is better? What about a woman who has already raised 3 children of her own vs. a young single girl fresh out of college. Does passing National Boards make her a better teacher. Not at all, and these situations are common.

National Board Certification does not serve the interests of teachers, taxpayers, parents, and most importantly students.

Here is an excellent report from the John Locke Foundation:
http://www.johnlocke.org/acrobat/policyReports/leefcertification2.pdf

 

Actually, teachers must have taught at least three years before they can try for National Boards. A "brand-new" teacher is unable to try for it. Once achieved, the teacher must remain teaching in a NC public school or repay the state for the cost of the process.

Teachers have the choice of whether or not to attempt certification. Some of the veteran teachers who choose not to try know they will not make it (NOTICE I SAID SOME, NOT ALL). These are the teachers who rarely step "outside of the box" to reach all students, assign a lot of busy work like worksheets that are actually rather meaningless, and use the same lesson plans year after year with no deviation. If you are involved in schools in any capacity, you know that there are teachers like that every school system. Fortunately, most teachers are NOT in that category.

Not trying for this certification does NOT reflect poorly on those veteran teachers who simply decide that the immense amount of time necessary to complete the process is too much work on top of teaching, family, and other commitments. It is a very time-consuming effort for which approximately 2% of teachers who attempt certification achieve it on their first try.

What is the main purpose? Teachers who achieve this certification have proved through numerous ways, including videotaped lessons and analysis of the way they grade student work, that they differentiate for all students, are able to adapt their teaching to meet the needs of students, and are able to reflect upon their teaching practices. These teachers also have to show the inclusion of parents and the community in their class. Two-way communication is also an important part. (Sending notes home is not two-way communication.) There are multiple criteria besides just subject knowledge and the ability to create lesson plans that must be met by the teacher. Furthermore, many people have said that teachers should not be paid based on years in the classroom but through merit. The National Board program does reward teachers who show they are some of the best in the nation. Teachers who earn this honor are not given it because they have "high student achievement." Having a 4.0 GPA in college does not make a person a great teacher. It simply means they can study and do well writing papers and taking tests.

I have my NB certification, as does my sister. I know many teachers who should have it, but they have not yet gone through the process. I do not know a single teacher with the certification who does not deserve it, and I have taught in several different counties in NC. In fact, those teachers who admitted to me that they were simply trying for the 12% salary increase did not make it.

 

Thank you A.C.F. for the first hand scoop on the NB's.

 

Thanks

Thanks All Children First.
Do you know if there are any statistics on the % of North Carolina teachers that are National Board Certified?

 

Some of the best teachers I know do not have National Board Certification. Some of the worst teachers I've ever worked with do. If you want to know who the good teachers are at a school, ask the students. They'll tell you what happens in a teacher's classroom day in and day out. National boards and administrator observations will tell you what happens on a few select days throughout the year.

This is not to say that there aren't good teachers who are also NBCT, but simply to point out that, in my experience, the relationship is correlational, not causal.

 

Ksky, I don't know what makes the NBCTs you have worked "some of the worst" teachers you know so I really can't respond to that. The fact that the best teachers you know don't have it could mean that they do not feel a need to go through the process.

Kelyel, the following is quoted from the NC Department of Public Instruction's website.

"National Board Certification, offered by the National Board For Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS), is a way to recognize the accomplished teaching that is occurring in North Carolina's classrooms. The certification process is based on high and rigorous standards that evaluates teaching practice through performance-based assessments; the ultimate result is improved performance and achievement for North Carolina's students.

National Board Certification was first offered in 1994, when eight North Carolina teachers received this important professional credential. The number of North Carolina teachers receiving the certification has grown dramatically since then today equaling over 10 percent of North Carolina's teaching force. North Carolina has the highest number of National Board Certified Teachers in the nation.

National Board for Professional Teaching Standards mission is to advance the quality of teaching and learning by

* maintaining high and rigorous standards for what accomplished teachers should know and be able to do;
* providing a national voluntary system certifying teachers who meet these standards; and
* advocating related education reforms to integrate National Board Certification in American education and to capitalize on the expertise of National Board Certified Teachers.

At the core of the National Board certification process are standards that describe the highest level of teaching in different disciplines and with students at different developmental levels. These standards represent a consensus among accomplished teachers and other education experts about what accomplished teachers should know and be able to do. NBPTS Standards can be found at www.nbpts.org.

Teachers who have participated in National Board Certification have overwhelmingly stated it is the most powerful professional development experience of their careers. They say the experience changes them as professionals and that through the process they deepen their content knowledge and develop, master, and reflect on new approaches to working with their students.

According to research conducted by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, teachers who have achieved National Board Certification by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) significantly outperform their peers who are not Board Certified on 11 of 13 key dimensions of teaching expertise, according to a study released by the National Board. Based on student work samples, the study's authors declared that National Board Certification "is identifying and certifying teachers who are producing students who differ in profound and important ways from those taught by non-certified teachers.""

 

I appreciate the practice of supporting your endorsement of the National Board process by including information provided by the National Board, but consider the source.

All I'm saying, in the absence of any research, is that NBCTs are not by definition better teachers, and that they can, in fact, be worse.

As for the statement that those who did it for the money didn't make it, how many teachers would even attempt it if it weren't for the pay increase? How many teachers would go through what is known to be a rigorous, time consuming exercise if all they stood to gain were a certificate and a gold pin? Virtually everyone does it for the money in one way or another. To suggest otherwise strikes me as naive at best.

 

The previous post gave the research information:

According to research conducted by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, teachers who have achieved National Board Certification by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) significantly outperform their peers who are not Board Certified on 11 of 13 key dimensions of teaching expertise, according to a study released by the National Board. Based on student work samples, the study's authors declared that National Board Certification "is identifying and certifying teachers who are producing students who differ in profound and important ways from those taught by non-certified teachers.""

 

Here's what Dr. Leef had to say about the Greensboro study (in the link I provided):
The 13 principles are all vague and subjective. What is an “optimal” classroom climate? How do we know if a teacher is sufficiently “passionate” to bring about good student performance?

The student work samples were not comparative. Someone just looked at them and said "Hey, these are really good."

"Does this research conclusively prove that NB certified teachers are significantly better at imparting knowledge and skills to students than are comparable non-certified teachers? The UNC-G study does not prove that. Initially, the paper rejects the use of student test scores as a means of telling how much educational progress they have made with this rhetorical blast: “It is not too much of an exaggeration to state that such measures have been cited as a cause of all the nation’s considerable problems in educating our youth...It is in their uses as measures of individual teacher effectiveness that such measures are particularly inappropriate.”

While testing is not a perfect measure of student learning, it is absurd to dismiss it completely.

My editorial added:
"National Board Certification, offered by the National Board For Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) (elite government eggheads), is a way (for the eggheads) to recognize the accomplished teaching that is occurring in North Carolina's classrooms. The certification process is based on high and rigorous standards (determined by the eggheads) that evaluates teaching practice through performance-based assessments (developed by the eggheads); the ultimate result is (in the opinion of the eggheads) improved performance and achievement for North Carolina's students.

Another quote about the Greensboro study from my link: University of Missouri economics professor Michael Podgursky, in a cogent analysis of the study writes: “In effect, the report really tells us only that teachers who were certified by the National Board were more likely to display the types of behaviors the National Board favors. Such a circular exercise does not necessarily prove that National Board-certified teachers do a better job of raising student achievement.”

ACF's quote with my editorial:

Exactly! They are given it because of some egghead's subjective opinion of how good a teacher is doing. Pay should be based on student achievement.

For all intents and purposes a teacher with 3 years experience is a brand new teacher. And a single 26 year old who has never had children of her own can get all the certifications she wants, but she does not compare to 45 year old with 20 years experience and 2 kids in college. Everybody has to start somewhere, but the question is - Are we as taxpayers and parents getting our money's worth from the increased pay from National Board certification? I don't think so.

I do. Do you know any who have failed the process that DO deserve it? I do. Some of them are favorites of the students and parents, have always been high achievers themselves, but most importantly - consistently have very high student improvement scores.

 

Yes, I know that. But what is clearly stated in the research is that it is "according to a study released by the Natonal Board."

When I said "in the absence of any research," I was referring to the fact that I have not done any; I'm speaking from personal experience.

Hope this clears things up. . .

 

Yes, it does. Sorry for my misunderstanding.

 

The views of Dr. Leef would not be biased in any way? After all it is a discussion of government spending in relation to the program. It seems the good doctor has a political view as well.

http://www.newcoalition.org/Article.cfm?artId=19910

Infatuated with Politics

Written By: George C. Leef
Published In: The Freeman: Ideas on Liberty
Publication Date: August 1, 2005
Publisher: Foundation for Economic Education

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If people came to understand that politics as a means to social betterment is a losing game and that it "works" only to enable some to get what they want at the expense of others, we might have a more sensible philosophical division--not between people who approve of state-sponsored compelling, preventing, and taking, and people who do not.



http://www.fff.org/issues/bookreviews.asp

 

Dr. Leef is anti-big government and anti-liberal there's no doubt. But still, I thought his report was very well written and based on facts. At least he exposed the lack of facts presented by the National Board.

If North Carolina is going to spend this amount of money, I think it should be based on measurable results, not because a bunch of government-appointed PHDs approve of the way a certain teacher performs her job. The focus should be on student achievement, not teacher performance. If a teacher is reaching kids and helping them move along faster than their peers, then he/she is the one who deserves a raise, not the teachers who meet the approval of some board.

 

Hey, I know this is an old thread, but I had to put my two cents into the discussion.

I am a National Board Certified Teacher...yea, me.
It was very hard work to complete the portfolio. The work is assessed by other experienced teachers trained to assess the work. 2 or 3 assessors independently assess each portfolio. The standards the portfolio must meet are in an objective rubric.

To pass the standards, the teacher MUST:
1) Communicate VERY well, in writing;
2) Have excellent planning and organizational skills;
3) Be able to teach effectively;
4) Understand students; and
5) Be able to pass a content area test proving they know and understand the content they teach above and beyond what an "average" teacher knows

I know there are wonderful teachers who failed these requirements. Some people just can't write well...even teachers. You have to be able to write well to pass. It took one of my friends who is a Wake county teacher three tries - and he is an excellent teacher. But he finally figured out that his answer didn't really match the question he was answering.

I don't know any NCPT teachers who are bad at their job. All of the ones I know are dedicated career teachers who deserve extra recognition and compensation for the leadership roles they take in their schools.

 

If a teacher can't write well, how would they know if their student did so? Could this be the reason for the propagation?

Defective tests are no reason to not have to take a test. Fix the test(s).

If they are all good at their jobs, then "Why can't Johnny read?"

Teachers should be at least as good as they expect their students to be when they graduate from the class. No teacher should object to being tested annually (or, at the very least, bi-annually) on the subject matter in which they are teaching.