Goals

I agree that more discussion needs to take place about what MTC is for. My personal view is the fist option you mentioned, to recruit and train people to stay in teaching. You cannot bring outsiders to Mississippi and hope for them to stay forever, so further restricting the goal would dramatically restrict your recruiting options, and the quality of the participants would suffer. I am a humanist. I believe in the betterment of humanity, not just in Mississippi, not just in the U.S.A., but all of humanity. And one good way to solve or at least mitigate some of the world's big problems is with better education, which starts with better teachers.

I believe that from the hundreds of applicants you have, nationwide, you should be able to find 25 of them who will make a significant career choice out of teaching, who in fact have already made the choice to be a teacher, but for whatever reason did not take the traditional route in undergrad. There is no harm in teaching in a critical needs school for two years and then doing something else. That is good. But we want to be great, right? MTC is really limiting its impact if it only looks for two years.

I disagree. For teachers to stay in their schools of initial placement (draconian, for sure!), or even in Mississippi, is unnecessary for the betterment of humankind, which is my concern, not Mississippi per se. In the broad view, increasing the overall supply of quality teachers should trickle down from top to bottom, state to state. So I feel it is not such a big deal where MTC teachers end up, only what they end up doing. Anyway, as stated earlier, trying to recruit only teachers who will stay in Mississippi would severely limit the recruiting pool to the extent that candidate quality would suffer dramatically. That is not at all an arbitrary distinction to me. By the way, I consider school administrators teachers for the purpose of this discussion, but I am not sure what exactly "lifelong advocates for education" means.

It seems to me, you choose your definition of greatness primarily because it is tidy and convenient, simpler to contemplate and easier to measure. How can you call it ambitious, though? To be the best at supplying inexperienced long-term temps? It is just too convenient, with no long view of the future. My definition is only slightly more complicated. Just consider one more factor: Length of service as a teacher.

Let me backtrack on something I mentioned earlier. I do not think we should only look for candidates who decided already, difinitely, to be teachers. That would not necessarily help increase the supply of quality teachers. But we should look for candidates for whom teaching, to give it an honest go, is at the top of their list, who are not just biding their time for something else.

Another thought: Good teachers are definitely needed at critical needs schools. But what did Good to Great have to say about putting your best people on your biggest problems? I think our placement is sometimes faulty. Some schools are too bad to send MTC teachers to. You only destroy them, as teachers, and accomplish nothing.