Education

Collaboration Key to Student Success

By Bryan Toporek — March 03, 2010 1 min read
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Cindy Rigsbee responds to the recent Metlife survey about teacher collaboration with delight.

The survey, which suggests a direct link between teacher collaboration and student success, rings true with Rigsbee, a former North Carolina Teacher of the Year.

Last night I shared the story of my first year teaching - 1979 - and how in that high school every classroom door was closed. Every teacher taught in isolation - there was no sharing of plans or resources, no discussions of student needs, no back and forth on what was working or wasn't. I spent my days talking only with children and found little avenues for getting any better at what I was doing.
As the years went by, those doors opened a little, but for the majority of my career there was still a mentality in the hallways and common areas of "I'm only going to address my own students, the ones I know, and leave the others to the teachers who teach them."
But now, according to the Survey of the American Teacher, 67% of the educators who completed the survey believe that increased collaboration has a direct effect on student success. And 80% strongly agree that teachers share responsibility for achievement of all students. We're in this together, folks, and I'm delighted to see that a majority of those questioned agree.

For more on the survey, check out Teacher’s special report about the findings.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Blogboard blog.