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I read with interest "Three Sisters (Not Chekhov's)," by Joe Nocera (column, Sept. 28):
There is an important point seldom made in the discussion of the preparation of teachers going into difficult schools. No matter how excellent the preparation, nothing but experience can prepare one for the potential volatility of the classroom.
When everything is calm and suddenly a fight breaks out that involves half the students in the room, fists flying, hair pulled, biting, shouting, cheering along the sideline — you name it — what does a teacher do? For that day at least, and for beginning teachers there are many like it, standardized test scores become irrelevant.
In that situation, the teacher in charge must have credible authority. Pedagogical theory is not enough. And in those schools, credibility comes with time.
It is the teachers who stay who have it. These are the teachers who the students trust will not abandon them by succumbing to burnout or moving on when the opportunity arrives. Students have a way of sensing who will stay and who will not.
What urban schools need more than anything are teachers and principals who stay and build community. Whatever it takes, that is the most necessary ingredient for reform in public education.
ROBIN LITHGOW
Los Angeles, Sept. 29, 2013
The writer taught in the Los Angeles Unified School District for 26 years.
To the Editor:
Kudos to Joe Nocera for highlighting the overly theoretical approach to preparing teachers in most traditional programs. Without clinical training, one in three new teachers in New York City exits the school system within three years, stymied by poor preparation and the lack of continuing support.
Fortunately, a partnership of Hunter College and New Visions for Public Schools is piloting teacher residency programs, which take a page from medical training. Residencies allow aspiring teachers to spend a year working alongside an experienced mentor before becoming full-time teachers of record. Early evaluations show that these teachers stay in the profession longer and have an almost immediate impact on student achievement.
Although still in their infancy, teacher residency programs are an innovation whose time has come.
ROBERT L. HUGHES
President
New Visions for Public Schools
New York, Sept. 28, 2013
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