The most recent data comes from fall 2000 tests. By giving teachers professional development training, they get better and better at what they do than when they first started teaching. And when they get better at what they do, kids do better. While the formula that better teachers lead to better students sounds simple, it takes time, money and cooperation from teachers and administrators to work well, educators said. Particularly daunting for Wichita is that roughly half its 49,100 students are from low-income families.
Experts say children raised in poverty often do poorly in school.
Yet we had kids at the 50 or 60th percentile in many areas. That's really amazing. Because state lawmakers believe in such training programs as strongly as the district, the Legislature reimbursed the district for about a quarter of its expenses. State officials also regularly alert Kansas schools about opportunities for learning as well as opportunities to share what they've learned, which is partly why Kansas is no stranger to the award the Wichita schools just won. The Olathe school district shared the same award with several schools nationwide last year while the Lawrence school district and the Woodrow Wilson Elementary School in Manhattan shared the award in 1997, the first year it was offered.