The Haberman Corporate Network for School Leaders

Submitted by Delia Stafford- Johnson, President
The Haberman Educational Foundation, Inc. is a 501C3 endeavor to solve the teacher shortage and find good personnel for public schools.

The most powerful and cost effective method to turn around failing schools is to provide them effective teachers and principals. Traditional means of recruiting, screening, training, and orienting teachers and principals have not provided an adequate pool of excellent school personnel specifically qualified to work in the neediest schools.  Solving the teacher and administrator shortage is now a high-priority on national and state agendas, as witnessed in many popular journals such as Time Magazine  (May, 2000) and Newsweek  (October, 2000).  Sadly, vacancies occur most frequently in the neediest schools where students at risk of school failure experience high teacher turnover.  Further, research shows that troubled schools require mature, competent, dedicated teachers able to connect with at-risk students. Alternative teacher certification specifically designed for second-career, mid-career or early retirees is a viable source of diverse teachers and principals who can meet students' pressing needs. Many mid-career switchers turn to teaching--not because of the income or the working conditions or the convenience of a nine-month calendar -- but because they are at the stage in their lives where they want to make a difference in someone else's life.

Between 2000 and 2010, nearly half of the 2.6 million teachers currently working will need to be replaced (Newsweek, Vol. CXXXVI, No. 14, October 2, 2000, p. 38).  In this same period, thousands of new school principals will be appointed. If all these vacancies are filled in the traditional ways with the same pools of come-and-go failures, prepared and developed in the traditional ways with the same demographically unrepresentative candidates, we can predict continued and expanded school failures with great certainty.  No school can be better than its teachers, and principals regardless of how much money or how many projects are pumped into it. The critical teacher shortage presents a unique opportunity to turn schools around in a highly cost effective way.  Most of the new teacher and principal appointees will be in schools serving 15 million children and youth living in poverty.  The most powerful strategy for closing the achievement gap between advantaged youth and those in poverty is to provide teachers and principals who want to make a difference in their lives.

The Mission.  The Haberman Educational Foundation (hereafter HEF) leaders have been involved in helping to formulate and disseminate programs accessible to midcareer switchers ("alternative teacher certification programs") since the mid-eighties when alternative teacher certification routes first began in New Jersey, Texas, and California. To date, about 30,000 new teachers who enter the profession through regular and alternative routes in fifty cities and school districts have been selected using the Haberman Star Teacher Interview.  The Star Teacher Interview is a well-researched screening instrument based on the profiles of highly effective teachers who have turned around failing schools and made a difference in the lives of children at risk.  In districts that use both the Star Teacher and the Star Principal Interview, schools have moved from the bottom to the top in student achievement, as supported by six current Ph.D. dissertations and the video, "Victory at Buffalo Creek" based on improvements in the Spring Branch (TX) Independent School District. Coupled with alternative teacher certification programs, the research-based Haberman Star Teacher and Haberman Star Principal selection interviews formulate a powerful  paradigm for improving schools while alleviating the teacher shortage. Both interviews have on-line pre-screeners for teacher and principals with easy access for school districts. These tools are being used nationally.

In the fall of 1994, the Haberman Educational Foundation, Inc, a 501(c3) was chartered to promote the research  based interviews developed by Distinguished Professor and nationally renowned educator Martin  Haberman. Eleven years later ,2006, the on-going services provided by the Haberman Foundation include related issues using state-of-the-art research. Instruction includes essential knowledge in 1) designing, building, and supporting alternative teacher certification programs, 2) selecting teachers and administrators who will stay and succeed, 3) supporting teachers and administrators through effective mentoring programs, and 4) provides school leaders with strategies to promote emotional intelligence, school safety, and a culture of learning. The Haberman Principal Academy was accredited by the Texas State Board of Educator Certification for the purpose of providing state-mandated instruction for principal credential renewal. The first Haberman Principal Academy was piloted in an ethnically diverse school district, Jacksonville Independent School District (Jacksonville, TX) during July of 2000. Replication of this accredited Academy throughout the country is a current priority goal of the HEF. In addition, the HEF has developed a superintendent's interview to train school boards to select their top administrators.      `

Proposal for The Haberman Corporate Network for School Leaders.  To facilitate a solution to the nationwide teacher crisis, the HEF proposes working with each corporate partner's education liaison to establish satellite training centers in strategic urban sites. There corporate partners would support local district acquisition of HEF technical assistance in personnel issues. Each corporate satellite would be a host for the Haberman Corporate Network for School Leaders.  The HEF and the corporation would partner to offer school districts training in The Star Selection interviews and/or The Haberman Principal Academy. The Haberman Corporate Network for School Leaders would then utilize each corporate partner to provide funding and establish a physical presence for the HEF. 

What would these centers accomplish that would dramatically improve failing urban schools and help relieve the teacher shortage?  The HabermanCorporate Network for School Leaders would enable the HEF to expand its work in several ways. 

Specific Request. Corporations or school districts would contribute:

• Facilities and equipment.  Each corporate facility may be used two-to-three times a year.  Facilities and equipment needed would include a TV, VCR, monitor, screen and overhead projector.  Seating for no fewer than 40 participants is desirable.
• Funding.  Corporate partners would provide funding for the training of their selected school district; the HEF would provide consultants, materials, travel and accommodation needs, and all other expenses.

Recognition for each partner corporation would also be given in publications produced by HEF.     Key personnel from each corporate partner will be introduced and recognized at each training where permissible.  Recognition would also be provided for specific contributions to a particular school district.