The Intern Teacher Training Initiative (ITTI)

In early 2010, Breakthrough Manchester partnered with its peer Breakthrough programs nationally to identify what makes great teachers. The result of this ongoing project has been the Intern Teacher Training Initiative, or ITTI. This work comes at an important time in the national dialogue around the role of effective teachers in producing academic success and tackle the achievement gap that plagues many American schools. Recent research has found:

• Having a high quality teacher throughout elementary school can substantially offset or eliminate the disadvantage of a low socioeconomic background.¹
• Having a top-quartile teacher rather than a bottom-quartile teacher for four years in a row would be enough to close the black-white test score achievement gap.²
• A teacher's influence on student achievement scores is 20 times greater than any other variable including class size and student poverty.³

With this in mind, twelve Breakthrough sites spent months developing a rigorous, research-based training model for teacher interns. The model of Breakthrough presents unique opportunities and challenges to training top-notch educators:

• Our teacher interns are pre-professional high school and college students who are seeking training in the best practices in teaching.
• As a small organization, we are able to be flexible enough to respond to student and teacher intern needs rapidly.
• Our professional Mentor Teachers are unparalleled educators who understand the connection between being using data and assessment to drive student academic outcomes.
• Everyone at Breakthrough has bought into the mission and the work of the program so getting participants on board with grass-roots initiatives comes naturally.

Manchester implemented this model this past summer and the results were immediately affirming. Teachers reported feeling better prepared for curriculum development, lesson planning, classroom management, and numerous other indicators. As a result, we saw a 12-point increase over the previous summer in students' math fluency Woodcock-Johnson post-test; similar increases were reflected in reading and writing fluency. One Mentor Teacher reflected that the ITTI model didn't eliminate novice mistakes that teachers made, but it resulted in teachers making better, higher-functioning mistakes that indicated a deeper understanding of successful pedagogical methods. These findings and others were similarly affirmed by our peer Breakthrough sites using the ITTI model.

On a larger scale, ITTI allows all Breakthrough teachers to receive a rigorous, researched, and tested training regimen. Their training, in turn, elevates the opportunities they will have when they enter the professional field. Already, Teach For America, one of the most competitive post-graduate options in the nation, has recognized the quality of preparation Breakthrough teachers receive by accepting them at three times the rate of non-Breakthrough applicants. As a result of this, TFA has agreed to formally partner with Breakthrough on a national level. Similarly, Boston's MATCH Charter School, ranked number 51 in US News and World Report's "America's Best High Schools," and renowned for their teacher training model, MATCH Corps, has also partnered with Breakthrough sites. These strategic partnerships create a formal pipeline for the best Breakthrough alumni to continue serving the students who most need great teachers and magnifies the impoact of Breakthrough's mission in schools across the nation.

We are proud to show of the results of the Intern Teacher Training Initiative. If you would like to visit Breakthrough at any time during the year and see our great teachers in action, please contact us at (603) 641-9426.

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1. Steven G.Rivkin, Eric A.Hanushek, and John F. Kain. Teachers, Schools, and Academic Achievement. University of Texas, Dallas: Texas Schools Project, 2002.

2. Robert Gordon, Thomas J. Kane, and Douglas O. Staiger. Identifying Effective Teachers Using Performance on the Job. Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 2006.

3. As cited by Daniel Fallon, Case Study of a Paradigm Shift (The Value of Focusing on Instruction). Education Research Summit: Establishing Linkages, University of North Carolina, 2003.