Massachusetts ASCD Supports
Educator Quality Bill

MASCD maintains dialogue with policy makers on issues affecting education and provides information to inform their thinking. Click here to contact your state or federal legislators with a few simple clicks, or to learn more about education policy issues.

MASCD Urges Governor-elect Patrick to Make Educator Quality His Top Priority

View the H 4157 Working Group for Educator Excellence

Educator Quality Bill - Massachusetts House Bill 4157
MASCD has been working for the past four years to provide expertise and generate support for educator quality legislation in the C ommonwealth:

Massachusetts Wireless Learning Project
MASCD is also providing testimony supporting one-to-one computing know as House Bill 1219

Act to Improve Quality Physical Education
MASCD is supporting legislation expanding quality physical education know as Senate Bill 334

Massachusetts ASCD has been working for the past three years to provide expertise and generate support for educator quality legislation in the commonwealth. Massachusetts House Bill 4157 compliments previous state education reforms on standards and accountability for students and equitable funding of school districts and focuses attention on the missing piece of education reform—educator quality.

Research shows that teacher and leader expertise is the most significant variable in student achievement; however, personnel systems for developing the educator workforce are severely dysfunctional. This bill is comprehensive in scope and positive in tone. It addresses ten processes of influence [pdf] relative to teacher and administrator preparation, induction, supervision and evaluation, professional development, and distributed instructional leadership. Its systemic approach [pdf] and funding [pdf] provide a model for the nation.

Jonathon Saphier, author and founder of Research for Better Teaching and Teachers21, and Susan Freedman, president of Teachers21 and a affiliate board member, initiated the effort to draft the legislation. Massachusetts ASCD voted immediate endorsement. Former Massachusetts ASCD President Isa Zimmerman, of Lesley University, board members Susan Henry, a National Board Certified Teacher and Harvard University doctoral student, and Peter Badalament, Bellingham High School principal and chair of the MASCD Influence and Advocacy Committee, and MASCD Executive Director Mary Forte Hayes serve on the Working Group for Educator Excellence [pdf]. In addition to featuring provisions of the bill in the affiliate's quarterly newsletter, Perspectives, and mailing updates to members, Massachusetts ASCD has maintained regular contact with legislators.

On June 9, 2006 the Massachusetts Joint Committee on Education held the first hearing on the bill. Isa Zimmerman, Susan Henry, and Mary Forte Hayes were among the fifteen education and business leaders and the two Massachusetts teachers' union presidents who gave powerful testimony and contributed written support in a booklet provided to lawmakers. Read copies of testimony [pdf]. MASCD also provided testimony at a fall hearing.

On February 6, 2006 legislators attended a briefing on the bill by Representatives Harkins and Haddad. Massachusetts ASCD urges members to call your state legislators to advise them of the importance of this bill. Massachusetts ASCD will remain on the front lines, advancing legislation and advocating for improved educator quality in Massachusetts.