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T

List of Acronyms

Teacher Certification: The process by which individuals receive state permission and qualification to teach in a public school. Many teaching certificates are highly specialized by subject, grade levels, or specifics such as counseling or the ability to teach students with disabilities. Also referred to as teacher licensure.

Teacher Evaluations: Methods of assessing teachers’ success in improving student achievement. Evaluations may include portfolios, observations, data, and other evidence of student achievement.

Teacher Incentive Fund: This U.S. Department of Education program supports efforts to develop and implement performance-based teacher and principal compensation systems in high-need schools. Goals include: improving student achievement by increasing teacher and principal effectiveness; reforming teacher and principal compensation systems so that teachers and principals are rewarded for increases in student achievement; increasing the number of effective teachers teaching poor, minority, and disadvantaged students in hard-to-staff subjects; and creating sustainable performance-based compensation systems.

Teacher-Student Identifier: An essential element of a longitudinal data system, a teacher-student identifier properly links each teacher to the students taught in their classes.

Teacher Union: An organization of teachers who have banded together to achieve common goals in key areas, such as working conditions and compensation.

Tech Prep: A career technical education program that includes courses at both the secondary education level and the postsecondary level.

Technical Skill Assessment: Used in career technical education, this assessment measures a student’s proficiency in their CTE program of study.

Title I: Part of ESEA, this is the largest federal aid program for elementary and secondary schools. The Title I program provides money to school systems based on the number of low-income families in each district. Support may be awarded for school-wide programs or for targeted assistance programs.

Title II: Part of ESEA, this is a federally funded program that provides assistance to state and local educational agencies and institutions of higher education with teacher education programs. Title II funds programs that aim to improve teaching and learning, reform teacher preparation and certification standards, and develop better performance-based assessment and professional development strategies.

Title VI: Part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that prohibits discrimination based on race, color, or national origin in programs and activities that receive federal financial assistance, including public schools. Title VI prohibits the denial of equal access to education to students with limited proficiency in English.

Title VII: Part of ESEA, this is a federal program designed to improve the English proficiency of bilingual students.

Title IX: Part of ESEA; a federal law barring gender discrimination in education facilities that receive federal funds. Most Title IX implementation cases involve sex equity in athletic programs.

Total Quality Management: A school-management concept adopted from the business world with a strong focus on client satisfaction and decision-making techniques that encourage workers to seek continual improvement in the organization.

Tracking: A term commonly used to refer to ability grouping—the practice of dividing students for instruction based on their perceived abilities. In education, many students have traditionally been assigned a particular “track” (college-bound, general, vocational, or remedial) and provided corresponding curriculum and instruction.

Transition Plan: A plan separate from a student’s Individualized Education Plan that documents goals for a student to aid him or her in making the transition from school to work.

Troops to Teachers: A U.S. Department of Education and Department of Defense program that helps eligible military personnel begin a new career as teachers.

U

List of Acronyms

United States Department of Education: The U.S. Department of Education is a cabinet level department of the United States. Created by the Department of Education Organization Act, signed into law by former President Jimmy Carter in 1979, the Department of Education identifies major issues in education and shifts national interest to them. The Department creates federal education policy and administers, distributes, and monitors funding. Additionally, the Department gathers data and oversees research on American schools.

Unsafe School Choice Option: This federal mandate, part of the No Child Left Behind Act, requires that each state receiving federal education funds establish and implement a statewide policy requiring that a student who attends a persistently dangerous public school, as well as a student who becomes the victim of a violent criminal offense while in or on the grounds of any public school that he or she attends, be allowed to attend a safe public school.

V

Virtual Schools: Accredited schools that teach a fulltime (or nearly full-time) course of instruction, primarily or entirely over the Internet, designed to lead to a degree.

Vocational Education: The former name for career technical education.

Voucher: A state allocation of money given to parents to allow their children to attend a school of the parents' choice, either public or private.

W

Work-Based Learning:  Education opportunities that reinforce core curriculum subjects through internships, apprenticeships, or other programs that place the student in a real-life work environment.

Y

Year-Round Schooling: A modified school calendar that offers short breaks throughout the academic year, rather than the traditional summer vacation. Schools may use a year-round schedule for a variety of reasons, including staggering schedules to relieve crowding. Others believe that shorter gaps between schooling will help students better retain material.

Z

Zero Tolerance: Policies that mandate predetermined consequences or punishments for a specific offense regardless of the circumstances surrounding it.

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