'You are not alone': a look at the rising trend in teacher 'onboarding' - Mastery Schools
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‘You are not alone’: a look at the rising trend in teacher ‘onboarding’

Newsworks.org
By Avi Wolfman-Arent

It’s a steamy summer morning in early August. Scott Gordon–CEO of the Mastery Charter School network–strides up and down the aisle of a packed school cafeteria in Germantown. About 250 teachers stare back at him from long laminate tables. Each of these teachers started with Mastery about 10 minutes ago. It’s been an intense 10 minutes.

“About one in ten kids who enter kindergarten will actually go on and get a bachelor’s degree,” Gordon says, pointing to a slide stuffed with grim statistics about the educational landscape in Philadelphia.

He pauses. A vacuum silence envelops the room, interrupted only by the the squeak of Gordon’s leather shoes as he paces.

“ONE in ten.”

For 15 years Gordon has delivered a version of this talk. It’s the first thing new hires hear when they arrive at Philadelphia’s largest charter chain. And it’s more sermon than welcome–complete with brimstone, and fire.