My Turn
National Board Certification: Time to Accentuate the Positive

Is National Board Certification for you? For this Idaho teacher, there's no doubt.

By Nancy Larsen

Idaho second grade teacher Nancy Larsen was certified as a Middle Childhood Generalist last year.

A couple of months ago, I was in a discussion about National Board Certification at a regional conference I was attending.

I was quite frankly stunned to hear some of the sentiments teachers in the room were expressing. Many were hostile to National Board Certification, with their criticisms centered around five main themes:

National Board Certification, these teachers charged, is elitist, takes money from the funding available for all teachers, is biased, costs too much, and takes too long to complete.

I disagree. Let me explain why, starting with the question of elitism. I understand why any elitism charge makes teachers wary. Labeling one group of teachers as the best creates divisiveness among us.

But I didn't seek to become a National Board Certified Teacher because I wanted to be considered one of the best. I sought national certification as a professional challenge, a chance to take a new look at my teaching and to feed my desire for growth.

Like many of my peers, I considered myself a quality teacher before I became a candidate. Board Certification hasn't changed that. I'm still the same person, working very hard to guide children's learning.

What has changed is that now I can justify my belief that I should be considered and treated as a professional. The standards established by the National Board are comparable to standards established for other respected professional careers.

By setting rigorous standards, National Board Certification promotes teaching as a profession. It's a step toward restoring the respect to teachers once taken for granted.

Where does the money come from to reward teachers for achieving Board Certification? In most states, this money has been allocated by specific legislation--and may not have made it into teacher hands without the impetus of National Board Certification.

I compare the money I receive as a nationally certified teacher to bonus pay I receive for achieving my master's degree. Each month, my paycheck is a bit larger because of the extra work I've done to earn my master's. This is common practice in school districts throughout the nation.

Teachers, especially teachers, are also deserving of an incentive for spending the extra time to achieve National Board status.

What about bias? Some teachers are concerned that the National Board assessment process might favor one teaching style over another. I, too, wondered about that.

In fact, teaching style never plays a part in the portfolio or assessment center exercises. What's important is that teachers demonstrate how what they do for children is based upon sound practice, or that they recognize areas where their practice isn't effective and present a plan for improvement.

I was reassured to find that the scoring process has been designed to maintain consistency and quality among the diverse group of teachers who volunteer to score entries.

To provide uniformity, each scorer attends a lengthy training seminar that includes specific training for recognizing and eliminating personal biases. For instance, regional dialect considered non-standard English in one area, but not in another, may not be considered while scoring.

And teacher names are never printed on entries and references to specific geographical regions in the body of each entry are discouraged.

Another step to achieving fairness: To eliminate bias in scoring toward those who are gifted writers, writing style is deemphasized.

The issue of time is, of course, a big one. A busy teacher values every minute in a day overflowing with responsibilities. It's not easy to find the time to complete a National Board portfolio and prepare for the assessment center exercises.

You have to find the right time to pursue National Board Certification, and that's always a personal decision. I decided to go for certification at a time when I was both mentoring an intern and serving as a lead teacher for my school.

I needed a boost to keep my practice with my students fresh. National Board Certification was the perfect opportunity for me.

The nearly 300 hours I spent working on National Board Certification were sandwiched into time slots I somehow found and set aside in the evenings and on weekends.

Yes, National Board Certification can be expensive, but teachers around the country are financing the $2,300 application fee in a variety of ways. More and more states offer full or partial funding to candidates.

Whether you decide to seek Board Certification or not, I hope you'll make your decision based on facts. Then it's really up to you.

Nancy Larsen teaches at Ramsey Elementary in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Her E-mail address is nlarsen@micron.net.

Editor's Note

You may have noticed a subtle change in some of the cartoons and illustrations placed throughout the issue.

For example, on our Letters pages, we've decided to dispense with the cartoon approach and add a little edge with an illustration.

Each month, we'll illustrate a couple of letters that have readers expressing a strong point of view.

This month, we took two letters about the controversial review of a new book about homework that appeared in the last issue, and we asked an illustrator to come up with a drawing to tie in with the letters.

On our humor page, we take a different approach. Here, we need more of a cartoon than a hard-hitting illustration to capture some of those special school moments we can all relate to.

Every month, by the way, cartoonists of all skill levels send us their cartoons, hoping to break into NEA Today. We welcome them all.

For the Inside Scoop feature, this month on page 31, we're using illustrations to convey facts, so our approach to graphics is quite different here.

To illustrate the Dilemma questions, we go another route. We employ the talents of Ted Pitts, an illustrator from Ohio with a style that's bold, very colorful, slightly irreverent. Do these graphic elements work for you? Let us know.

Finally, let me just mention two new features of our online edition of NEA Today, which can be found at www.nea.org/neatoday.

Beginning with this issue, we'll be doubling the number of TV Tips listings available on NEA Today Online.

And, again starting with this issue, we'll also be providing hotlinks online straight to all the Web Winners listed in our Resources section. One click will do it!

—Bill Fischer