Education Trend Includes Coaches in Classrooms

As you know I enjoy researching the very latest trends in education, so that I can keep my website www.roccobasile.org up to date. I found an interesting article on the Internet today, written by Emily McCormick, a teacher and curriculum facilitator at Fairlawn Elementary School in Evansville. Her article talks about the fact that today’s schools are now implementing of instructional coaches in classrooms. It is one of the fastest growing trends in education.

Why? Apparently because schools are faced with greater accountability than ever before and to meet this demand, many school districts are seeking new methods of supporting professional development among teachers to strengthen teaching practice and improve student learning. Some districts use coaches to help implement reform while others focus on particular critical areas such as mathematics, science and reading to support broad implementation of best practices in the classroom.

In some instances, like a pitching coach, these professionals narrow their focus to anticipate and support the unique needs that face a small group of players on the team. Trends across the nation also indicate that districts providing targeted assistance to certain populations of teachers, such as those within their first five years of teaching, have greater success with retention of quality employees and increased student achievement.

This reminds me of the fact that this is why our programs have been so successful for Children of the City. With 15,000 kids dropping out of school every year, our founder and president Joyce Mattera founded Children of the City in 1981 to reach out to kids in the Sunset Park community of Brooklyn, New York.

House-by-house, a small group of volunteers began visiting children weekly to assess their needs and invite them to various community programs, helping them by means of academic support, life skills training, family counseling, holiday dinners, Christmas gifts for hundreds of children each year.

Our volunteers include those who participate in the Create Success program which is constantly being evaluated for needs and even better success, and it is fast becoming a model sought after by other agencies for their own after school program sites. High priority is placed on student’s academic success with intense tutoring and daily personal homework help, and provides the student with counseling, advocacy within the social systems such as courts, plus age-appropriate group and individual mentoring.