Documentation

Every Teachers Institute prepares an annual report that describes its scope, strategy, goals, and progress. Each established Institute maintains data on teacher and faculty participants. These reports include evidence that the Institutes remain in accord with the Teachers Institute approach. They describe, where appropriate, the curriculum units recently developed, the relationship between participating school teachers and university faculty, the nature and extent of leadership exerted by teacher-participants, the incentives for university faculty members and school teachers to participate, and the assistance from the Yale National Initiative that has been needed, obtained, and used. They include an analysis of the participation of school teachers in Institute activities, using surveys and other instruments developed by the Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute and modified as needed to make possible comparisons across the partnerships. The data include, for example, the school and subject or grade level of each Fellow, the seminars in which each participated, the leaders of the seminars, the curriculum unit titles, and information on each Fellow's continuing employment in the district. With the help of the school district data office, the reports may document and analyze the impact of teachers' participation in Institute seminars and leadership roles on the professional performance of its teachers and the academic achievements of their students. And they analyze the factors contributing to, and hindering, the success of the Institutes, and the effects of those Institutes upon teacher preparation and empowerment, curricular change, and other issues central to school reform. They also give an account of the progress made toward current and continuing funding of the Institutes. At specified intervals, the reports also will include surveys of the use of curriculum units by Fellows and non-Fellows in the school systems.