Lenzy Krehbiel-Burton
Tulsa World Staff Writer
OKLAHOMA CITY — As part of the district’s required monthly presentation, TPS officials updated Oklahoma State Board of Education members Thursday about the recent decision to participate in the Oklahoma Teacher Empowerment Program leading up to the Oklahoma State Testing Program window in mid-April and early May.
Tulsa Public Schools Superintendent Ebony Johnson, right, speaks beside acting Deputy Superintendent Kathy Dodd during the Oklahoma State Board of Education meeting Thursday.
“We want our students to step up and show what they know,” Tulsa Public Schools Superintendent Ebony Johnson said. “I am looking at my schedule so that I can specifically go and see our sixth- and seventh-grade students.”
TPS was approached by State Superintendent Ryan Walters after Feb. 23 about participating in the program, which provides additional one-time payments to up to 10% of a district’s teachers in exchange for extra contract days and additional obligations. Eight days later, the application window closed for TPS teachers.
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“For the record, I’m a little worried about that (speed) setting a precedent for future projects,” joked TPS Executive Director of Data and Analytics Sean Berkstresser.
According to a copy of the application obtained by the Tulsa World, English language arts teachers and reading interventionists around the district whose students showed the most growth on the reading portion of the NWEA MAP test from either fall 2022 to spring 2023 or fall 2023 to winter 2024 were invited to apply.
Among the demands placed on TPS to retain its accreditation is that at least half of its students score at at least basic level on the English language arts portion of state tests this spring or increase the number of students meeting that threshold by at least 5%.
Of the 118 TPS teachers invited to apply for the program, 54 submitted an application and 45 were accepted. Those 45 teachers come from 24 sites across the district and have an average of 10 years of teaching experience.
With TPS’ own projections showing that the district needs to accelerate learning for 700 students, its involvement with the Oklahoma Teacher Empowerment Program is expected to reach about 1,100 students in grades 3-8 through small group instruction.
As part of the district’s participation in the program, OSDE pledged to send employees with teaching certificates to cover participating teachers’ classes.
Sixteen OSDE employees with current teaching certificates started covering classes at Cooper, Council Oak, Dolores Huerta, Eliot, Eugene Field, Lewis & Clark, Skelly and Wayman Tisdale elementary schools; Thoreau Demonstration Academy; and Memorial and Tulsa Met high schools after spring break. OSDE employees are also providing small group supports at Hale and Monroe middle schools.
Among the certification areas represented by those employees are early childhood education, grades 5-8 English language arts, elementary education and business education. Four have a special education certificate, and one has a speech language pathology certificate.
However, according to documents obtained via an open records request, the remaining classrooms are being covered by substitutes through Kelly Services, the staffing agency used by TPS to coordinate substitute teacher placements.
State Superintendent Ryan Walters was not made available to reporters after the meeting to answer questions, including whether his agency is paying for those additional substitutes.
During the meeting, both Walters and Tulsa-area board representative Don Burdick lauded Johnson and other TPS representatives for their efforts to launch the program. The district’s presentation was moved up on Thursday afternoon’s agenda in an effort to get TPS leaders back to Tulsa quickly in light of a massive power outage that affected multiple campuses.
“I just don’t think that you can overstate how incredible their launching of the Oklahoma Teacher Empowerment Program was,” Walters said. “For them to take, I mean it’s an incredibly innovative program, but to take dozens of the best teachers … and were able to navigate the logistics of figuring out who those teachers are, where they would go, taking our employees, plugging them in, then finding retired teachers, bringing them in, to get to their point, making this as seamless as possible so that the kids that need the instruction are getting that, but also that you’re removing this teacher from the classroom so you’re actually filling that classroom with a really great teacher, too.
“To do that in eight days — I just don’t think I can overstate it.”
Although both Walters and Burdick lauded the district’s participation, a representative from the Tulsa Classroom Teachers Association took to the podium during public comments to express her concerns that the decision would have lasting negative consequences on TPS’ workforce.
“This automatically leaves out a high percentage of high performing teachers because they don’t teach language arts this year,” TCTA Vice President LeeAnn Jimenez said. “This also leaves out those educators who have subjective teacher evaluation scores.
“The premise behind this program is that competition will bring out the best and the brightest in our educators. The reality is that we have educators who are looking to leave this year. Test scores might rise — eight sessions with a great teacher will do the trick, right? But what about next year?”
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