Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/1480924
of the best are doing, how can our students be expected to compete in the new global economy? And what does that reality mean for their future — and the future of our nation? Those questions drove Ballard, winner of the national Milken Educator Award in 2003, to become the first doc- umented K-12 teacher to complete a self-funded study of schools in every country that regularly beats us on PISA exams. During summer breaks over the course of a decade, he visited more than 170 schools in nearly two dozen countries. Ballard talked his way into meetings with top education officials in Estonia, bathed in the icy Rhine River so he could visit schools in pricey Lichtenstein and ate in a school cafeteria in Singapore. He even toured classrooms in enigmatic North Korea, filming hundreds of hours of You- Tube videos along the way. Calling Ballard a "pioneer," Marc Tucker, founder of the National Center on Education and the Economy, said he's "the first schoolteacher I have met in the United States who has taken it upon him or herself in a serious way to under- stand what these educationally superior countries are doing and to accept that they might actually have something to teach us." In some ways, Ballard discovered, schools in these countries couldn't be more different. But by blending hard data and firsthand accounts from inside successful school systems, he identified eight areas where countries with top education systems share common ground. Now Ballard is on a mission to share those solutions. He's done dozens of T V interviews and delivered a TEDx Talk this spring. This summer, he published a book (with help from me, a writer who's also a former English teacher) that's titled "Stealing from the World's Best Schools: What One U.S. Teacher Learned by Visiting Countries that are Doing Public Education Right." A key factor Ballard discovered is that countries with top education systems offer more support to both families and teachers than the United States. When parents have a child in Singapore, for example, the government deposits $3,000 into an account that can be used to cover costs such as early education and healthcare. As for teachers, they 're paid starting salaries on par with new engineers in most coun- tries that outrank us on PISA exams. Teachers also have up to two-thirds of their paid time each day set aside for col- laboration and professional development, including to visit top schools in other countries. In return for those investments, these countries can maintain higher expectations for both parents and teachers. Solid support systems help ensure parents have capacity to better support their child's education by showing up to a teacher 's open house and helping with homework. At the same time, better pay and training for teachers gen- erates more respect for the profession, which also eases issues with recruitment and retention. Consider that it's not uncommon in Canadian cities for 10 qualified educators to apply for each open teaching position. And while places like Arizona are so desperate for teachers that they 're dropping Ballard shoots video while observing instruction at an Estonian vocational education school. Below, he talks to high school students in South Korea. Ballard's book was published in June. 14 cta.org Spotlight