Issue Position: Support Excellence in Teaching

Issue Position

Support excellence in teaching. I've taught most of my life helping future teachers prepare for the classroom. Every student deserves a quality teacher and every teacher deserves the support and respect of the community. Young teachers need longer mentoring periods, including internships with experienced master teachers and in school teaching supervisors to ensure that they learn best practices and can apply these skills to the classroom. We need to continually use a range of evaluating support systems in the classroom and quickly provide teachers with feedback on how they can improve their skills and become effective teachers. Research shows that keeping experienced teachers in the classroom is a far better and more economical practice, saving money in the long run. Replacing experienced teachers is irresponsible, costly and harmful to our students. The latest research studies show that it takes three to five years for most teachers to reach their stride in this profession. We need to stop the ceaseless firing and opportunistic removal of experienced teachers in the Denver Public Schools and other districts across Colorado. Ensuring every student has quality, experienced teachers is the first step to closing the achievement gap.

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