TNLI Impact

Here are some of the ways that TNLI fellows are sharing their research findings to impact other classrooms and also to influence educational policy.

- Second-year TNLI Fellow Liz Goss will represent CFE on the newly established Teacher Leadership Advisory Council, a council created to establish a direct line of communication between the classroom and CEO, Arne Duncan.

- At the suggestion of Teachers Network's national university advisor, Liz Goss has submitted her work, "Learning to Be a Good Guy: Teaching for Social Justice in the Primary Classroom" to the national teaching journal Young Children. The paper is also in press for another quarterly journal, Rethinking Schools, which publishes articles focusing on the topic of school reform.

- Liz Goss discussed her work in a teleconference with the Teachers Network University Advisor, Frances Rust, and approximately 25 student teachers from New York University. Liz also presented her work to fellow Chicago teachers at the Teachers for Social Justice Curriculum Fair in November and her colleagues at Legacy Charter School where her work is directly influencing a new school wide social justice curriculum.

- Katie Peterson submitted her work, "First Grade Problem Solvers," to the Harvard Educational Review, also at the suggestion of Teachers Network.

- Suzanne Martinez presented her research, "In Search of Connectivity: How Authentic Learning with Technology Engages Middle School Students" at the Regional Educational Office "Raising Student Achievement" Conference on December 5^th in St. Charles, IL. Suzanne will also present at the 2006 American Educational Research Association's (AERA) national conference in San Francisco, CA. AERA is considered the most prestigious national educational conference among academics.

- After doing a feature of her work in the CPS Technology Department's newsletter, Suzanne Martinez was asked to write a monthly feature on technology integration. She has also been asked to sit on a standards-based instruction collaboration using internet resources at Northwestern University.

- Cynthia Brawner presented her work on reading instruction and fluency to fellow teachers at the American Association for Curriculum Development (ASCD) in Washington, D.C., in fall 2005.

- Marjorie Rogasner will present her work with immigrant parents at the State Bilingual Conference in late January. She also spoke to her Local School Council regarding her research on parent involvement in early September, resulting in significant modifications to her school's report card pick-up/parent conference format.

- In Fall 2005, Rosemary Barilla and Karen Dreyfuss used the results of their research to conduct a professional development workshop to improve writing instruction school wide.

- In October 2005, Fellows Faren D'Abell and Suzanne Martinez attended the TNLI National Conference in Wilmington, Delaware. Suzanne's PowerPoint presentation of the event "From Research to Advocacy" is featured on the Teachers Network website at http://www.teachersnetwork.org/tnli/tnli_2005meeting.htm

-In January 2007, the Chicago Tribune Newspaper published a letter from Chad Kirkpatrick, Raymond Lau, Suzanne Martinez, and Margie Rogasner about the lack of consultation with teachers when creating education policy such as the No Child Left Behind act.