Traditional teachers and the Teachers' Unions constantly harp on TFA, saying "how can they learn to be teachers in 5 weeks of summer training when it took me 4 years?"
Setting aside the facts that these TFA Corps members have 40% higher SAT scores than Education Majors, that TFA accepts only the top 10% of the applicants and that the applicants represent the cream of the best colleges in America - I learned one more reason why students of TFA teachers are so successful:
Teach For America has a rigorous, regular, on-going training system that rivals the very best corporate training programs I have experienced.I was fortunate to be invited to the bi-monthly Memphis TFA Saturday training session on October 17, 2009, and saw first-hand the quality of content and instruction TFA provides its Corps members.
I also learned a few more facts about Teach For America:
1- 63% stay in education after their 2-year commitment - that's 63%!!!2- More than 360 TFA alums are school leaders
3- 47% of those leaders are in traditional public schools
Memphis is fortunate to have Brad Leon as our TFA executive leader. He also shared some data from a Gallup Poll about THE ACHIEVEMENT GAP: