New research out of North Carolina seems to confirm earlier studies showing that Teach for America teachers are a bit more effective than teachers who come out of traditional teachers' colleges. That's good news, as it justifies the program's recent expansion to new regions, such as Boston. Indeed, the argument that alternative teacher certification programs cheat needy kids out of good, dedicated instructors is quickly being neutralized. Nevertheless, fewer than 15 percent of TFA corps members remain in the classroom after four years, even if they stay, broadly, within the field of education. So amid good news about the program, we still need to keep TFA in perspective -- it simply isn't a fix-all for the American education system. There are about 5,000 TFA teachers nationwide, but 2.5 million teachers in the United States. In New York City, which has a high concentration of TFA teachers -- 1,000 of them, to be exact -- the program reaches 60,000 kids. But there are 1.1 million children in the New York City public schools. When it comes to improving teacher quality, policy makers must have a plan beyond increasing the number of elite college graduates in the profession. That is TFA's model, and it works well on a relatively small scale. Increases in the starting salary for teachers and in performance pay may attract even more academically talented young people to the profession. But in reality, the majority of American teachers are still trained at local teachers' colleges that do not have particularly competitive admissions processes. Those institutions need to be brought into the policy conversation, and ought to be more actively regulated in terms of the training they are providing to the people who teach our kids. States that commit themselves to this project would be good candidates for grants from the $5 billion "race to the top" fund that is part of the stimulus package. --Dana Goldstein
