Modernizing the Teaching Workforce for Learner-Centered, Competency-Based, Equity-Oriented Education: State Policy Recommendations

This issue brief highlights state policy opportunities to create a shared vision to modernize professional learning for educators in a K-12, competency-based education system. Educators will be prepared for a future-focused profession that better meets the 21st-century demands of student learning and workforce needs. In it, we make five recommendations to leverage the unique role of state policymaking: 

• Convening a state task force to craft a unifying vision and roadmap; 
• Increasing the diversity of the educator workforce; 
• Preparing teachers for learner-centered, competency-based, equity-oriented education; 
• Redesigning teacher licensure and credentialing; and 
• Building balanced systems of assessments that enable learner-centered, competency-based, equity-oriented teaching. The brief also details specific policy actions for each recommendation.

The recommendations describe actions for state policymakers to enable and enact the vision described in the CompetencyWorks report, Moving Toward Mastery: Growing, Developing, and Sustaining Educators for Competency-Based Education.