Philadelphia Notebook's Interview with Superintendent Arlene Ackerman

Philadelphia Public School theNotebook: Ackerman: 'This has got to be radical.':

Notebook: What do you think about the argument that there should be more robust incentives to get teachers into the hard-to-staff schools?

Ackerman: Money is not the only thing that is going to get them there. [Teachers] ask for several things: a great principal—they will not go if you don't have a great principal. They ask that we address some of the larger societal issues that impact children's learning—health issues, emotional, social kinds of issues, psychological—which is why we put in place the social service liaisons, the student advisors, the parent liaisons.

The other thing that [experienced teachers] have said to me is that they want to be in the lowest-performing schools in cohorts or groups of five or six, because if you're there as a singleton or a doubleton, it's too hard. Those teachers get overwhelmed not only with the issues that they're dealing with in their classroom, but then they're trying to support and mentor new teachers.

And I think on top of that, we just have to look at paying teachers differently. Teachers are in this 19th century model: we all get paid the same thing, and you earn more money by the number of years you put in. That doesn't make sense, and that doesn't happen in any other business but education now.

Read the entire interview.