RESEARCH DESIGN

Mathematics Specialist Cohorts

The centerpiece of our project is the preparation, support and deployment of two cohorts of 12 Mathematics Specialists (a total of 24 specialists). Participating school systems 1 have identified a total of 12 triples of schools with comparable student demographics and student performance on Virginia ’s SOL examinations. One school will be randomly selected from each triple, and these 12 schools will be assigned a Mathematics Specialist beginning with the 2005-06 school year. Two years later, the second school randomly selected from each triple  will be assigned Specialists beginning with the 2007-08 school year. Individuals will be selected by the participating school systems to receive Specialist training and support, and then be assigned to serve at Mathematics Specialists in the randomly selected schools.

Specialists are being prepared as teacher and curriculum leaders.  They will be positioned between classroom teachers and school administrators to provide leadership and assist in improving mathematics education.  Within their school-based roles, they will:

• Work with building administrators and staff to plan, implement, and evaluate effective mathematics programs that support improved teaching and learning; 
• Support teachers’ efforts to identify, implement, and refine the use of instructional resources and strategies through coaching, co-teaching, and modeling lessons;
• Work to implement instructional and assessment strategies meeting the needs of diverse student populations;
• Work with administrators and teachers to analyze student work, to assess students’ understanding, and to interpret assessment information to inform instructional programs;
• Plan and facilitate professional development focused on staff members needs in implementing high quality and challenging mathematics programs for all students.
• Translate mathematics standards and research into classroom practice to support implementation of the Virginia Standards of Learning and the NCTM’s PSSM; 
• Provide assistance to  teachers, especially first year teachers and “career switchers”, addressing mathematics content and pedagogy;
• Facilitate parent workshops in mathematics and ways to work with their children;
• Work with and model intervention programs with small groups of students;
• Team together within the three systems via internet and regular meetings.

Mathematics Specialist Preparation Program

The project will develop, pilot and offer a core set of six graduate mathematics and mathematics education courses that will enable future specialists to develop a broad, research based, vision of the mathematics curriculum, student learning and teaching.  The project will also provide the additional support needed by individuals selected to serve as Specialists. This effort will be led by Loren Pitt and Vickie Inge, and the courses developed will be strongly influenced by the work of the Coalition Taskforce chaired by Vickie Inge. 

The four mathematics courses Number Systems and Operations; Geometry and Measurement; Statistics and Probability; and Functions and Algebra are each aimed at developing a profound understanding of basic school mathematics.  Two Mathematics Education Seminars will be coordinated with the mathematics courses and will run for two academic years of each cohort’s program.  These seminars will provide participants opportunities to explore issues of assessment, curriculum, cognitive research, and pedagogy that relate to the mathematics they are studying, and in the context of their students and classrooms.  The seminars will include components on leadership and teacher professional development facilitation.

Course Development

Using a highly successful course development model 2 that has long been used in Virginia by the VMSC, for each course/seminar, a Course Development Team will be formed, consisting of college mathematics faculty, college education faculty, experienced mathematics coordinators, and classroom teachers.  Each course will be offered by Norfolk State University , a HBCU,  in Norfolk , Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond , and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville 3. We believe that the research conducted will benefit from having the prospective Specialists enroll in courses taught by three different sets of instructors. This will be more typical of what will occur in an established program.  A set of training sessions (faculty development seminars) will be developed and offered to the team of instructors in the project, both university and school personnel, who will be teaching each section of the course/seminar. Enrollment will be limited in each section of the course to 20 individuals, including, of course, the four teachers from each region who are in the pilot cohort.  The development and instructional teams will remain together through the project and refine courses after their first offerings based upon their experiences and the preliminary findings of the research team concerning measures the mathematical content and pedagogical knowledge and beliefs of the Mathematics Specialists.