Teacher attendance is the clearest early warning sign of teacher turnover, and Dr. Tommy Chang, CEO of New Teacher Center, says most school systems are not watching it. He was not watching it either when he ran Boston Public Schools.
In this episode of The Stronger Podcast, Mike Montoya sits down with Dr. Tommy Chang, CEO of New Teacher Center and former Superintendent of Boston Public Schools, to talk about what actually keeps new teachers in the classroom.
Tommy immigrated from Taiwan at six without a word of English. His first grade teacher, Helen Cowles, taught him to read and write, and he traces his belief in public education back to that classroom. He came into teaching on an emergency credential in Compton in 1997, which is why he will not argue about pathways. Whether a teacher arrives through a traditional program or through a state that now allows almost no credentialing, his position is that the coaching has to be guaranteed either way.
He and Mike get into the numbers most systems overlook, including why attendance predicts turnover twelve to eighteen months out and why district-level data hides what is actually happening school by school. Tommy also names the leadership shift he has made, away from the warrior superintendent who runs through walls and toward what Atul Gawande called pit crews rather than cowboys. He is honest that the tension between urgency and patience has never resolved for him.
Tune in to hear why Tommy thinks the real job for leaders of his generation now is learning to get out of the way.
Chapters:
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01:49 Tommy Chang arrived at six without English and later ran Boston's schools
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07:06 Teaching careers now run six to eight years, not fifteen
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09:37 Why turnover only makes sense when you read it school by school
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15:33 Teacher attendance predicts turnover twelve to eighteen months out
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21:23 The Carnegie unit and a school model still designed for 1908
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30:33 From the warrior superintendent to pit crews instead of cowboys
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39:20 From Strength to Strength and the pivot from doing to coaching
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41:08 Find your role in the movement and lean into your strengths
Links:
Connect with Dr. Tommy Chang on LinkedIn or explore New Teacher Center's work to see how school systems build the capacity to coach and mentor their newest teachers.
Stay strong.
Episode 44