As I was preparing for my workshop, Get Connected! Your Students and Colleagues Need You at this year’s AASSA Conference, a workshop that intended on getting teachers connected via Twitter, and would help them create a professional e portfolio, I knew I wanted to include some evidence of the assertion I was trying to make. I wanted to discuss reasons why having an e portfolio was a good idea. Among them, opportunity for documentation and reflection of professional experience, sharing to get feedback from other professionals and contribute to the global conversation on education, as well as, a favorable view in the eyes of recruiters when thinking about the next job hunt. I wanted to show evidence of a recruiter’s interest in a candidate’s professional portfolio. So, I put together a quick survey to send out to the PTC Principals email list that asked recruiters to rate the value of profesional e Portfolios. To my dismay, the responses looked like this:
Upon seeing this, I turned to my wife and said, with a certain amount of indignation, “How can we expect schools to successfully teach students New Literacies when we don’t expect our teachers to demonstrate they have these competencies? If school leaders don’t prioritize these skills in teachers, how can they expect teachers to successfully incorporate them into their teaching? If we don’t value 21st Century Skills in our teachers, isn’t that a sign that we don’t value them in our teaching?”
Of course, a professional e portfolio alone isn’t the only place a teacher could demonstrate these competencies, nor does it guarantee that they can teach them. My wife reminded me of this, checking my indignation. Then, I looked more closely at the results. I left the opportunity for open ended comments in the survey, and these were some of the responses.
Most teachers I hire do not have [professional portfolios] but the ones who do stand out.”
“It can be a useful resource for understanding practice. If it is just a platform for more philosophical description, it does not add to a simple digital CV or statement.”
“It allows an insight into a candidate and their attitude before the interview process.”
“A teacher’s eportfolio helps me get a sense of the teacher’s abilities, interests and IT abilities, however, the interview and references are still my main focus.”
“I love the opportunity to view actual teaching, passions, and areas of accomplishment. An eportfolio gives you a chance to know the candidate before you interview them and is a better window into one’s creativity and personality.
So, while few of them mention that the e portfolio allows them to look for New Literacies competency, they do value e portfolios on some level. They won’t necessarily make or break a teacher’s chance of getting recruited, but they do help the teacher stand out in the crowd. Maybe that’s because of the insight it gives them, or maybe that’s a subconscious indicator of a savvy teacher for recruiters. Given all the other characteristics a teacher must possess, that might actually be a more balanced approach than my indignation would expect to see. After all, I can’t dismiss the years of collective experience these school leaders have in identifying strong teachers. Right? So, for the sake of my workshop, I had what I needed, but I was still disappointed.
There were also a fair share of responses that looked like this:
I haven’t seen an ePortfolio”
“While I realize I should look at them more, to be honest I don’t usually.
I can’t help but wonder if we’re not prioritizing specific technology skills in particular, and 21st Century skills more broadly (yes, they are two different things) in our teachers enough. We look for teachers that understand how to use standards and benchmarks, how to lead inquiry, how to give useful feedback, how to build relationships with their students, how to differentiate for diverse learners, how to engage parents, etc. etc. Shouldn’t we also pay close attention to how they do this? Aren’t technology tools valuable resources for supporting these? Isn’t collaboration a valuable skill that will impact student learning positively? Don’t we need teachers to think critically about the learning experiences and space they design? Isn’t the teaching experience a series of problems that must be solved?
Some data and insight from Pew Research is relevant to share here, in particular, a presentation examining the difference in learning between millennials and the older generations. One key idea stuck with me:
What does this mean? Well another bit of research from 2006, also from Pew, might help us understand. It found that people used the internet to mobilize their personal network in times of crisis. They used email to more quickly access a broader network of resources for support. Now, consider that 2006 also saw the launch of Twitter. In 2007 the smartphone explosion was ushered in with the launch of the first iPhone. Three years later, in 2010, we saw the Arab Spring, an uprising that saw people mobilizing their network, through social media, in a time of crisis in a big, big way. These benefits aren’t abstract. They are quite concrete. Fast forward to the end of 2016 and we find ourselves in the Fake News Era, where our network not only helps us in times of crisis, but must help us to discern truth from fiction. This all leads me to two important ideas.
All this to say that there is an urgency to teaching New Literacies now more than ever. If the recent past is any indicator, it will become more and more important as time goes on. Are we recruiting with this urgency in mind? Are we recruiting with the understanding that we’re 18 years into the 21st Century and we are still sorting out how to teach 21st Century Skills?
If not, if recruiters aren’t necessarily focused on hiring teachers that demonstrate these competencies, or prioritizing them, then how can we support teachers once they are on board? Offering support without having expectations will have little impact. Without expectations, teachers will see this as something extra to dismiss. Should expectations of 21st Century teaching and learning competencies be built into teacher evaluation systems? At my school we’re near the end of our first year implementing an evaluation system based on Kim Marshall’s work. There is little to no specific mention of these skills in his rubrics. Marshall encourages schools to modify his rubrics. We have plans to eventually integrate the ISTE Standards for Teachers into them. Do you see this as a valuable step? Once the expectations are there, then we can discuss systems of support to meet those expectations.
So, how about it, principals, heads, and other recruiters? Am I misinterpreting the results of this very unscientific survey? Are you prioritizing technology and 21st Century competencies when recruiting teachers? If not, why not? If so, how are you identifying teachers that have them?
