Not Magic
Leadership,
Highly effective
teachers show what
it takes to close
achievement gaps.
Steven Farr
One of the recurring joys of my work is seeing the transformative, life- changing influence of teachers like Gillette
Eckler. When Gillette met her 4th graders
on her first day as a teacher in New York
City, they were reading, on average, at a
2nd grade level. They were even further
behind in math, unable to add and subtract numbers of more than one digit.
Outraged by the injustice of a system
that gives low-income students like hers
low odds of even graduating from high
school, Gillette determined that she
would do everything in her power to
change their academic trajectory. She was
convinced that her “scholars” had the
same potential to achieve that students
in higher-income communities did. She
seized on the goal that they would gain
access to the most prestigious middle
schools in the city—schools that would
put them on track to college. “These are
the schools that my students deserve
to know about and have the chance to
attend,” she explained.
© Photos courtesy of teach for america
Gillette began by building a classroom
culture around hard work and hard-earned success. She established ambitious
growth goals for each student and broke
those goals into minigoals with detailed
plans for the order and pace of objectives.
Using a system of individualized progress
folders and a student-created “Super
Scholars” wall display, Gillette rallied
her students and their families to work
hard toward their goals. As a culture
of achievement took hold, students
begged to be reassessed on their reading
progress, competitively scrutinized other
classes’ progress, and helped one another
so that the whole class could reach its
monthly benchmarks.
Gillette went well beyond conventional parameters, stretching time and
resources. She extended the school day,
Teacher Joe Almeida commands his
students’ full attention.
