Mountaineer Mathematics Master Teachers: A Networked Improvement Community Building Capacity for Mathematics Teacher Leadership in West Virginia

罗伯特·诺伊斯教师奖学金计划能力建设项目旨在为西弗吉尼亚州的中学数学教师领导渠道奠定基础。西弗吉尼亚州面临着特别突出的挑战，根深蒂固的贫困、经济停滞和教育水平低，学生在数学方面的成绩落后，至少部分原因是全州范围内缺乏高素质的数学教师。与此同时，该州丰富的文化和强大的社区网络为围绕数学教与学的研究和改进努力创造了独特的背景。首席调查员(PI)的总体目标是解决该州缺乏先进的教师发展机会和教师领导角色的问题，方法是让利益相关者聚集在一起，澄清对数学教师领导的需求，集体集思广益，确定教师领导在各级改进中可以发挥的正式作用，并确定如何最好地为教师领导在农村和阿巴拉契亚地区的工作做准备和提供支持。这些努力将为该州目前缺乏的中学数学教育硕士项目的设计提供参考，该项目的重点是培养数学教师领袖。通过创建从熟练教育者到教师领导者的专业数学教学管道的蓝图，该项目旨在改善全州的数学教学和学习，这反过来可能会导致更多的西弗吉尼亚州学生获得STEM学位并进入STEM职业生涯。使用网络改善社区(NIC)方法，这是西弗吉尼亚大学和波卡洪塔斯县学校之间的合作伙伴关系，由西弗吉尼亚州教育部和美国研究所的一名执行研究员贡献，PI旨在解决该州数学教师领导力的途径和可能性。项目团队计划将重点放在NIC的特许阶段，这需要对问题、产生问题的系统以及阐明集体解决问题的一套目标和行动的改进理论有深入的了解。利益相关者的反馈和有关学生和教师人口统计、学生成绩和教师资质的数据将为这些努力提供信息。来自全州的项目工作人员、高等教育教职员工、州教育领导、地区和学校管理人员、教师领导和课堂教师将参加特许会议，并由一名熟练的教育研究顾问提供便利。会议应成为一次机会，让多个孤立的利益攸关方共同定义一个复杂的问题，并围绕行动理论达成一致。这些改进工作的实施将被仔细地记录和分析，以产生关于在农村背景下培养和支持数学教师领导力的建议，项目团队打算通过国家组织以及学术和实践者出版物广泛传播这些建议。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program Capacity Building project is meant to lay the foundation for a secondary mathematics teacher leader pipeline in West Virginia. West Virginia experiences particularly prominent challenges with entrenched poverty, economic stagnation, and low educational attainment and faces lagging student achievement in mathematics due at least in part to a state-wide shortage of highly-qualified mathematics teachers. At the same time the state's cultural richness and strong community networks make for a unique context for research and improvement efforts around mathematics teaching and learning. The overall goal of the principal investigators (PIs) is to address the lack of advanced teacher development opportunities and teacher leadership roles in the state by having stakeholders come together to clarify the need for mathematics teacher leaders, collectively brainstorm the formal roles teacher leaders could play in improvement at all levels, and define the ways to best prepare and support teacher leaders for work in rural, Appalachian contexts. These efforts will inform the design of a Master's program in secondary mathematics education, currently lacking in the state, focused on developing mathematics teacher leaders. By creating a blueprint for a professional mathematics teaching pipeline from skilled educator to teacher leader without removing the most effective teachers from the classroom, this project aims to improve mathematics teaching and learning across the state which in turn may result in more West Virginia students seeking STEM degrees and entering STEM careers.Using Networked Improvement Communities (NIC) methodology, this partnership between West Virginia University and Pocahontas County Schools, with contributions from the West Virginia Department of Education and a managing researcher from the American Institutes for Research, the PIs aim to address the pathways and possibilities for mathematics teacher leadership in the state. The project team plans to focus on the Chartering Phase of a NIC, which entails developing a deep understanding of the problem, the system that produces it, and a theory of improvement that articulates a set of aims and actions for collectively addressing the problem. Feedback from stakeholders and data on student and teacher demographics, student achievement, and teacher qualifications will inform these efforts. A Chartering meeting will involve project staff, higher education faculty, state education leaders, district and school administrators, teacher leaders, and classroom teachers from across the state, and be facilitated by a skilled education research consultant. The meeting should serve as an opportunity to engage multiple siloed stakeholders in collectively defining a complex problem and coalescing around a theory of action. Implementation of these improvement efforts will be carefully documented and analyzed to produce recommendations for fostering and supporting mathematics teacher leadership in rural contexts which the project team intends to broadly disseminate through national organizations and scholarly and practitioner publications.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.