Wendy Kopp Students Quotations

Research confirms that great teachers change lives. Students with one highly effective elementary school teacher are more likely to go to college, less likely to become pregnant as teens, and earn tens of thousands more over their lifetimes.

Common Core reminds us what testing can do right. Modeled on standards of the world's education superpowers, questions demand critical thinking and creativity. Students are asked to write at length, show their work, and explain their reasoning.

Research shows that whether you are low-income or not, mindset is a bigger predictor of success than academic skills, and how students gain great academic skills and persevere in the face of challenges.

Mindsets, skills and leadership, experience and access, and critical consciousness - we need all four of these things for our students to be the leaders, people and citizens we want them to be.

We have found that the most successful teachers in low-income communities operate like successful leaders. They establish a vision of where their students will be performing at the end of the year that many believe to be unrealistic.

When I started Teach For America as a college senior, I sensed that there were thousands of talented, driven college students and recent grads who were searching for a way to make a real difference in the world.

As a white woman with a privileged education, I'm keenly aware that I founded an organization that can only realize its goal if it enlists many more leaders who share the backgrounds of the students and families we work with.