The Narrowing of Curriculum and Pedagogy in The Age of Accountability Urban Educators Speak Out

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The Narrowing of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the

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The Narrowing of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the Age of

Accountability Urban Educators Speak Out
Margaret S. Crocco and Arthur T. Costigan
Urban Education 2007 42: 512
DOI: 10.1177/0042085907304964
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Urban Education
Volume 42 Number 6
November 2007 512-535
© 2007 Corwin Press
The Narrowing of 10.1177/0042085907304964
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in the Age of Accountability

Urban Educators Speak Out
Margaret S. Crocco
Columbia University
Arthur T. Costigan
Queens College, CUNY
Under the curricular and pedagogical impositions of scripted lessons and

mandated curriculum, patterns associated nationwide with high-stakes testing,
the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, and the phenomenon known as the
“narrowing of curriculum,” new teachers in New York City (NYC) find their
personal and professional identity thwarted, creativity and autonomy under-
mined, and ability to forge relationships with students diminished—all critical
factors in their expressed job satisfaction. These indirect consequences of
accountability regimen as it operates in NYC may exacerbate new teacher
attrition, especially from schools serving low-income students. The data reported
here suggest a mixed picture of frustration and anger, alongside determination,
resistance, and resilience in the face of these impositions. Responses vary by
school and grade level, lending support to the notion that the organizational
environment serves as a critical factor in teachers’ early career decisions
about staying or leaving a school or the profession.
Keywords: curriculum narrowing; teacher attrition; NCLB
Prelude
There has been increased pressure from administration and the district office
over the last few months to adhere to all of the staples of the literacy program.
Just today, the principal and assistant principal of my floor went on a third
floor walk through. They went from class to class checking to see if each
classroom had certain things in place. They were looking for particular artifacts
and classroom designs. As they went from class to class, they took notes and
completed a checklist. Many teachers spent the previous day ensuring that
their classrooms adhered to the standards. I believe that the new curriculum
512
Crocco, Costigan / The Narrowing of Curriculum and Pedagogy 513
and classroom design is having an effect on the teaching staff. The atmosphere
in my school has changed since the program was put in place. The teachers
that I work with used to enjoy coming to work. However, since the new program
was introduced, the teachers in my building seem to be more uptight. They
worry about not having certain artifacts in their classrooms. Indeed, some
teachers have even left the school because of the new curriculum. Last year, 10
teachers moved on to work in other schools. I know for a fact that at least 3 of
those teachers left because of the new curriculum. A good friend of mine left
because he did not like being told how to arrange his classroom and how to
teach. I fear that if working conditions within the school are not improved,
there will be many more teachers looking to leave at the end of this school year.
A middle school English teacher
P revious research (Kauffman, Johnson, Kardos, Liu, & Peske, 2002)

has indicated that some new teachers are “lost at sea” in urban settings
because of insufficient guidance about what to teach and how to teach it.
This article argues that an equally vexing problem may be narrow prescriptions
of such matters. As a result of the curricular and pedagogical impositions of
scripted lessons, mandated curriculum, and narrowed options for pedagogy
in many New York City (NYC) middle and high schools, new teachers find
their personal and professional identity development thwarted, creativity
and autonomy undermined, and ability to forge relationships with students
diminished. These problems sometimes result in their leaving poorly
performing schools, especially when they see the school culture as too restric-
tive and the leadership unsupportive of their efforts to develop a personally
satisfying teaching practice.
We have also found that many new teachers are remarkably resilient in
finding ways to deal with the challenges of “learning to teach in an age of
accountability” (Costigan & Crocco, 2004). Such variation in outcomes
depends on multiple factors: school culture (and its leadership and mentoring
conditions), grade level (because narrowing of curriculum and pedagogical
options is sometimes more extreme in NYC middle schools), and teacher
pathways into the NYC public schools (either through alternative preparation
or traditional teacher education programs).
This research provides insiders’ perspectives on what has been called the
“narrowing of curriculum” (Dillon, 2006; Jerald, 2006; Manzo, 2005). This
phrase has been used to convey the notion that testing pressures associated
with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act entitled “No Child
Left Behind” (NCLB; U.S. Congress, 2001) have increased time devoted to
reading and math at the expense of other subjects. We use the term here in
a slightly expanded fashion to signal the reality that not only have subjects
514 Urban Education
such as science and social studies lost time in schools but also that the
prescribed curriculum frequently limits pedagogical options. Even when, for
example, social studies gets taught, the mandated curriculum at the high
school level is so broad as to restrict teacher choices about how it is taught.
Some attention has been paid to the effects of curriculum narrowing on
students (e.g., Manzo, 2005; von Zastrow & Jane, 2004). Although some
research has been done on the effects of high-stakes testing on teachers,
much of it was conducted before NCLB and in settings quite different from
NYC (e.g., Grant, 2003).
Based on the research presented here, we conclude that curriculum
narrowing has had a negative effect on beginning teachers’ perceptions about
their opportunities for developing a satisfying teaching practice. Although
we are not naive in thinking that teachers’ needs should be the only consider-
ation in improving schools, we see our findings as important in raising issues
related to teacher attrition. We believe that keeping high-quality teachers in
NYC public schools, and we count our graduates among them, is essential
to improving these schools. We acknowledge that a balance must be struck
between autonomy and accountability in devising scope for professional
discretion over curriculum (Boote, 2006). At the present moment, however,
in some schools, the balance seems to have tipped too far in the direction
of accountability, due in large measure to the effects of NCLB.
The teacher narratives highlighted here have been culled from dozens
of interviews with beginning teachers at the middle and high school levels
in NYC. These teachers’ voices offer another perspective on the statistical
data provided by economists, sociologists, and policy makers concerning
the effects of NCLB. Clearly, schools are complex institutions in which the
mix of students, teachers, and administrators function synergistically to
create success or failure in promoting student achievement. We have found
teachers’ perspectives overlooked all too often in the discussion of the
complexities of school reform, especially within the accountability frame-
work. Previous research has shown the degree to which the denial of teacher
autonomy in factory-like schools undermines good teaching practice
(Elmore & Sykes, 1992; Ingersoll, 2002, 2003a; Ingersoll & Smith, 2003).
In presenting teachers’ voices, we are not taking a stand on the validity of
their critiques so much as holding that, in matters of job satisfaction, percep-
tions are paramount. Nor do we intend to portray teachers as either paragons
or passive victims. However, if teachers perceive school conditions as under-
mining their job satisfaction, they will move onto other schools or leave
the profession entirely (Johnson & The Project on the Next Generation of
Teachers, 2004).
The new teachers we interviewed enter the profession fully aware of the
problems of urban teaching and committed to what many consider a vocation
as well as profession (Hansen, 1994). They spoke of resistance to, and occa-
sionally anger about, the impositions associated with the accountability
movement, but they are also resilient, a word we associate with elasticity,
flexibility, and tenacity in working within challenging school cultures.
The struggle to improve schools in NYC has been a seemingly intractable
problem for decades (Ravitch & Viteritti, 2000). Improving student achieve-
ment in NYC public schools is important; retaining good teachers is essential
to this goal.
Accountability, New York Style
Until the 1980s, most states had no exit exams for high school. New York
has been different in this regard for decades; its state-prescribed curriculum
in major school subjects and Regents exams for academically able students
were established early in the 20th century. Until the 1990s, however, students
in New York State were allowed the option of taking the Regents Competency
Tests as an alternative to Regents exams. As part of the educational reform
movement nationwide, New York Commissioner of Education Richard Mills
and the Board of Regents decided that all students seeking high school
diplomas would be required to pass five Regents examinations, standards
that have been lauded as “among the highest in the nation” and based on
“educational and moral grounding” (Michelli, 2005, p. 236). New exami-
nations were also introduced in various subjects in elementary and middle
school grades.
In NYC, many students have difficulty passing standardized tests. The
passing grade on Regents tests was changed from 65 to 55 and back to 65
again for certain tests. In spring 2005, more than 80% of the city’s 8th graders
failed in the social studies test (Herszenhorn, 2005). Regents’ examinations
in social studies are now given at 5th, 8th, 10th, and 11th grades. Teachers
must cover an extensive history-oriented curriculum at each grade level that
is invariably taught in a teacher-centered fashion to “cover” the material.
English Language Arts (ELA) tests are administered in the 4th, 7th, and
8th grades with complementary curricular programs in balanced literacy1
designed to bolster test scores, especially in “hard-to-staff” schools and
“Schools Under Registration Review.” In the districts whose schools provide
the regions in which this study’s ELA teachers have taught, scripted lessons
have been used for several years. Currently, the scripted program used in
516 Urban Education
these schools emphasizes preparation for workforce participation. Balanced

literacy and scripted lessons make a variety of demands on how teachers
teach, including
a physical room arrangement involving grouped desks, work stations, learning

centers with themed or topical materials, and a library with books arranged
and labeled in a specific mandate fashion;
bulletin board, blackboard, and wall used to illustrate tasks, rubrics, standards,
daily agenda and daily schedules, samples of student work and teacher
comments, displays of posted comments and teacher- and student-generated
artifacts, including learning charts, problem-solving strategies; and
use of student journals and portfolios.2
The juxtaposition here of two subjects in the NYC curriculum provides

complementary perspectives on the effects of accountability. On one hand,
greater emphasis in discussions of student achievement has been placed on
the subject of ELA than on social studies, a subject that itself has been “left
behind” in the emphasis on literacy, numeracy, and to some degree, science.
At the same time, ELA teachers have experienced the narrowing of teaching
options related to literacy, especially at the middle school level. Packaged
programs including lessons scripted on a minute-by-minute basis allow little
room for teacher deviation from the prescribed outline. By contrast, social
studies teachers at the middle school level report little time each week
devoted to teaching social studies. One middle school strategy for dealing
with this problem seems to be to merge social studies subject matter into the
ELA curriculum through use of historical fiction. At the high school level,
the problem is somewhat different: Teachers complain about the breadth
of the social studies curriculum that results in narrowing their pedagogical
options. Many conclude that the only way to “cover” the curriculum is
through direct instruction, that is, lecture or lecture with recitation. As we
will document below, teachers report “shrinking space” for curricular and
pedagogical innovation, creativity, or autonomy.
A final note on mentoring in NYC: In August of 2004, NYC launched a
large-scale, highly touted new induction program that, it was hoped, would
help curb the high levels of teacher attrition throughout the system (New
Teacher Center, 2006). Although this program was constructed to protect
mentees’ confidentiality, it has also been set up to help reinforce district,
city, and state mandates. With about one third of all new teachers in NYC
coming into the system through the alternative certification route (New
Teacher Center, 2006, p. 22), the system’s capacity to mentor new teachers
is currently stretched to meet the needs of this group, with regularly certified
teachers a lower priority. Thus, the mentoring program is not meeting the
needs of many new teachers. Furthermore, as we will see, the problem is
compounded when considerations of the quality of mentoring are taken into
account.
Conceptual Framework
Our conceptual framework for this article includes three stances: First,
we believe that teaching is important work and should be considered a
profession. Second, in keeping with this perspective, we believe that teachers
function as critical decision makers in schools. Third, we believe that deci-
sions about staying or leaving schools or teaching often depend on the degree
to which teachers find satisfactory working conditions in school settings
that allow them to make connections to their students.
First, research shows that good teachers are important to student outcomes;
an argument suggesting that teaching is highly skilled work worthy of being
considered a profession (e.g., Crocco & Costigan, 2006; Darling-Hammond,
2005; National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, 1997, 2003).
In NYC, “nearly fifty percent of teachers have less than five years teaching
experience” (New Teacher Center, 2006). Lankford, Loeb, and Wyckoff (2002)
have analyzed teacher retention in urban schools, finding that “teachers
are more likely to leave poor urban schools and those who leave are likely
to have greater skills than those who stay” (p. 55). Problems of teacher
retention have been well documented in other highly diverse districts such
as Los Angeles (Quartz et al., 2004; Quartz, Lyons, & Thomas, 2004).
Second, we believe that all teachers function as curriculum-instructional
gatekeepers (Thornton, 1991). Teachers bring expertise to their work; indeed,
new teachers are often seen as bringing sufficient expertise to their work to
assign them precisely the same responsibilities in the classroom as veteran
teachers face every day. Beginning teachers deal with well-documented
challenges as they begin their work, and studies indicate that they seek
communities of practice to help them determine ways to promote their own
growth as teachers and student achievement (Kardos & Johnson, 2007;
Louis, Kruse, & Marks, 1996; Newmann & Wehlage, 1995).
Finally, studies of teacher attrition indicate that new teachers with strong
credentials are among those most likely to leave the profession during their
first years of teaching (National Council on Teacher Quality, 2004). Data
indicate that although teacher pay often contributes to decisions about staying
518 Urban Education
or leaving, this is not the most important factor. Instead, beginning teachers
cite working conditions, including the quality of the leadership in their
schools, as the most important factors in such decisions (Cochran-Smith,
2004; MetLife, 2005).
Given these research findings, we were interested in understanding how
beginning teachers thought about their jobs in NYC’s middle and high
schools, especially in an era in which the “narrowing of curriculum” was
emerging as a major theme related to NCLB and its effects in the schools.
Methodology
In light of the fact that we believe teaching to be intensely personal work,

we chose to study beginning teachers through the use of qualitative research
focused on eliciting narratives about their work (Clandinin & Connelly,
1996; Clark, 2001; Huberman, 1993; Levin, 2003). We were in a position
to seek out for new teachers because we both teach in large programs of
teacher education in NYC. One of us prepares English teachers for middle
and high schools at a large public university in one borough of the city; the
other prepares social studies teachers for the same levels at a private university
in another borough.
Although we began our projects independently of one another, early on
in the process of doing separate investigations, we were introduced to one
another. We then decided to work collaboratively toward convergence of
questions and approaches so that our merged efforts might provide a broader
investigation into the lives and work of beginning teachers spanning two
distinct institutions and school subjects. We also learned quickly that we shared
a basic commitment to inquiry-oriented teacher preparation, which we later
described in a book entitled Learning to Teach in an Age of Accountability
(Costigan & Crocco, 2004)
For a variety of reasons, our research protocols did not end up being
perfectly symmetrical. Nevertheless, there was a high degree of overlap in
the questions we asked students and the semistructured approaches we took
to the formal interviews. We believed that by using teacher voices to describe
the “local, situated complexities” of teaching and learning, we might shed
light on the debates about the accountability movement and its effects on
beginning teachers in the largest public school system in the United States
(Rex & Nelson, 2004).
We began our fieldwork in 2000 and have conducted roughly 200 inter-
views during the last 5 years, interviewing most participants on multiple
Table 1
Teachers Interviewed for This Research Project
Less Than 1 Year One Year of Two to Five Years Five Years of
Teachers’ Field of Experience Experience of Experience Experience
English teachers 24 25 35 20
Social studies teachers 25 25 30 35
occasions. Participants had anywhere from months to several years of teaching

experience at the time we interviewed them. No teacher had more than
5 years of teaching experience—a critical juncture in decision making about
leaving the profession altogether (Table 1).
Our interviews lasted anywhere from 30 to 90 min. Because we inter-
viewed many subjects several times, we ended up with more than 200
interviews. These interviews were augmented by dozens of “focus-group”
conversations held with small groups of beginning teachers. These results
were triangulated with additional data derived from informal conversations
with preservice and in-service students engaged in student teaching and
graduates about their work, observations of student teachers in NYC schools,
journal writing and classroom assignments in the preservice, and in-service
programs.
When we began our research, our interview and focus-group questions
were open ended. We did not wish to ask “leading” questions because we
sought to develop grounded theories emergent from the interview data about
the decision-making factors shaping our participants’ thinking about staying
or leaving NYC’s schools. We began by asking participants in a variety of
ways to tell us about their experiences teaching in the schools. We discussed
their jobs, colleagues, schools, schedules, whether they were able to “have
a life” out of school, and what had brought them into teaching.
We sorted, resorted, and analyzed our data (Bogdan & Biklen, 1992).
Gradually, themes emerged related to teachers’ perceptions of their work. We
synthesized data and drew tentative conclusions. At each step of this process,
we shared themes and conclusions with interview subjects in both formal
and informal settings to participant check and thereby test the trustworthiness
of our representations (Ely, Anzul, Freidman, Garner, & Steinmetz, 1991).
In many cases, we were able to do additional focused interviews with
participants to test our tentative hypotheses and explore alternatives.
The teachers we interviewed were predominantly women and over-
whelmingly White. Otherwise, several differences emerged between the two
520 Urban Education
cohorts. Overall, participants from the public university tended to be working

and middle class. In some cases, they were among the first in their families
to graduate from college. They often viewed teaching as a step into a profes-
sion that held the promise of becoming solidly middle class. By contrast,
many teachers from the private university came from more affluent back-
grounds, having graduated from prestigious private and public colleges.
Occasionally, they told stories of their parents’ or friends’ disappointment
with their career choice, implying that it was a step down the status ladder
for graduates of elite colleges or members of their family.
Some participants were NYC teaching fellows (NYCTF), an alternative
certification program designed to recruit people from business and industry
to teach in “hard-to-staff” schools. These individuals receive a promise of a
free master’s degree and state certification in return for a commitment to
teach in “hard-to-staff” urban schools. They tend to be somewhat older than
the other individuals we interviewed. During the last 5 years, the NYCTF
program has provided around 6,000 new teachers to NYC’s five boroughs
and less than 500 new teachers to communities in upstate New York.
We make no claim here of representational validity for all beginning
teachers in NYC’s secondary schools. Admittedly, ours is a sample of conve-
nience, that is, students and graduates from our respective programs willing
to speak with us at length on multiple occasions about their induction into
teaching. Thus, this is very much a study rooted in the particular position-
alities of those who agreed to participate, with all the limitations such research
entails. We also recognize that some individuals interviewed may have been
telling us what they thought we wanted to hear. Given the large number of
participants interviewed from two different universities and the consistency
of themes articulated during the span of 5 years, we do not believe this factor
skewed the results. In fact, because we were careful to frame the study to
potential participants as an investigation of the lives of beginning teachers
in NYC rather than as a study of the new culture of accountability, we do
not think participants agreed to speak with us simply to express objections
to the accountability movement.
Shrinking Space
I did not become a teacher for the money or the time off. I felt that I had some-
thing to offer young people and I would do my best to impart what knowledge
I have accumulated over the years to them. Yet I am treated as if I do not know
how best to attend to the needs of my students. I am handed scripted lessons,
as if I lacked the ability to assemble my own. I am told how to arrange the
desks in my classroom. I am told how to tell my students to quiet down (there

is a noise meter that we must have in our classrooms). I am told that I must
have certain artifacts in my classroom. I am told how to structure my lessons.
I am told how to comment on a student’s paper. I am treated as if I were inca-
pable of doing these things on my own.
A middle school English teacher
The Regents really shapes the way I run the class . . . I have to cut out certain
cooperative activities because they’re time consuming. It definitely affects
my teaching. It’s always in the back of your mind. . . . Certain topics I would
expand on, especially if they were relevant to the kids or of particular inter-
esting to me, but I don’t because they’re not tested on it.
A high school social studies teacher
These new teachers regularly complained about what one of them referred
to as the “shrinking space” for their classroom-based decision making. In this
section, we explore three aspects of the “shrinking space” phenomenon: first,
the new teachers’ acknowledged need for support of a certain sort; second,
their desire to forge meaningful relationships with students; and third, their
assessment of what they feel they need to grow professionally.
At the beginning of our interviews, we asked them why they had chosen
to become teachers: They responded by telling us they wanted to “make a
difference” in young people’s lives and a contribution to society and to work
in a knowledge-oriented field. Their views echo the motivations documented
in other studies (Fried, 2005; Hammerness, 2003). They recognize the “trade-
offs” accompanying choice of the teaching life. They know that they have
opted for a career with relatively low-compensation levels for their educa-
tional investments, especially over the long term. They also recognize that
they must contend with the perception, in certain circles, that teaching is low-
status work, especially for talented people. Indeed, a nationally representative
sample of teachers (MetLife, 2005) found that only 1 in 10 teachers strongly
agree that “teachers are respected in today’s society.” Although such
perspectives surface to varying degrees among our subjects, it is clear that
they recognize the rewards, costs, and challenges of becoming a teacher,
especially in NYC.
These teachers seemed less “lost at sea” (Kauffman et al., 2002) in
confronting the demands of their work than frustrated by their inability to
use expertise acquired through their professional preparation. They believe
that scripted lessons and mandated curriculum not only deprofessionalized
their work but also depersonalized the human connections nurtured by
more student-centered curriculum and pedagogy (Costigan, 2004, 2005).
Standardized approaches to teaching colluded to shrink the space afforded
522 Urban Education
them for devising personal solutions to problems encountered in their

classrooms.
Looking for Support for Creativity and Autonomy

I do not like the new curriculum. I do not like being told how to teach. I feel that
the scripted program is a pseudo-progressive program, disguising itself as an
innovative trend-setting curriculum when it is anything but.
An English teacher
The literature in social psychology reports that the positive relationship

between autonomy and job satisfaction holds true for most well-educated
workers (see e.g., Koustelios, Karabatzaki, & Kouisteliou, 2004; Richer,
Blanchard, & Vallerand, 2002; Ross & Reskin, 1992). The desire for autonomy
among the teachers we interviewed was strongly related to their desire to
do good work. Although they sought autonomy, they were also looking for
support from mentors and administrators, but support of a certain sort. They
wanted collegial and structured work environments along with supportive
and effective leadership that helped them make good decisions as teachers
in the best interests of their students.
By contrast with these ideals, our participants repeatedly complained
about the rigid fashion in which they were forced to teach, whether dealing
with scripted ELA lessons or mandated curriculum in history. One young
teacher noted as follows:
I am told that I must have certain artifacts in my classroom. I am told how to

structure my lessons. I am told how to comment on a student’s paper. I am
treated as if I were incapable of doing these things on my own.
Although this level of regimentation is not a new phenomenon in poor

urban schools (Talbert & Ennis, 1990), the degree of prescription seems to
have reached unprecedented levels. Social studies teachers commented that
“It’s not even the testing; it’s the size of the curriculum that influences my
teaching,” and “my curriculum is completely driven by the Regents.”
Operationally, such remarks reflect two realities: First, teachers feel
compelled to maintain a frenetic pace to cover the vast amounts of material
prescribed for Regents high school level courses; and second, teachers found
this pace frustrating to their development of a satisfying practice. Many felt
the lack of time available for developing projects or digging more deeply
into subject matter relevant to students damaged their efficacy. Despite
teachers’ prodigious efforts at preparing students for Regents exams, many

of their students failed these exams: “We did test prep; a lot of things
connected to our curriculum were related to the test. But still, I guess, it was
not enough for our students to do really well on the test.”
Many new teachers disavowed the significance of the tests as meaningful
indicators of their students’ progress during a year. They argued that classroom
performance was a better indicator of students’ ability to move onto the next
grade and graduate from high school. They commented that their views on
what constitutes good teaching often deviated from administrators’ expecta-
tions, which were more in line with rigid adherence to the curriculum and
adoption of whatever pedagogical methods would “cover” the curriculum.
Such conflicts created a tension-filled school environment in which new
teachers found themselves constantly negotiating the competing demands of
administrators and their own judgments as teachers. “Managing the political
climate and negotiating for what we know is best educationally feels like
such a drain of energy,” one said. Many of them were investing an excessive
amount of energy in dealing with school politics. Working in places with
“two camps” in constant friction seriously undermined their ability to focus
on the needs of students and to extract some measure of satisfaction from
their daily work lives.
Forging Meaningful Relationships With Students

I’m sorry I’m leaving my kids. I feel like I’m letting them down. But, honestly,
I can’t stay here [in the city] because I’ve been offered a really good job in
[the suburbs]. I went on an interview and on the board was “self-assessment
next week.” The teacher was from [a local private university] and is really
a progressive with students in groups and all that. This just can’t happen
in the city. There’s almost no freedom here to help the kids as you should.
An English teacher
A huge part of my job satisfaction is personal relationships with my students.
Originally, this was something of a problem but now it’s better. And having
successful relationships with my students correlates, I’ve found, with their
achievement . . . I am lucky to be working with folks who are dedicated to
urban schools and their students.
A social studies teacher
New teachers saw autonomy not only as important to their own job
satisfaction but also pivotal to their ability to address the changing needs
of students, a perspective supported by previous research on teaching
(Sergiovanni & Moore, 1985). Like many teachers nationwide (Alder, 2002;
524 Urban Education
MetLife, 2005), they consider the development of caring personal relation-

ships with their students as essential to fulfilling their mission. Their desire
to bridge social differences is a central aspect of the personal and profes-
sional identity they seek to foster through their work. Many young teachers
told us that bridging these differences ranks among their greatest accom-
plishments. They became teachers because they believe that education can
open up new opportunities in life. This faith often came out of their personal
experiences and the role schooling had played in their lives. They were not
uniformly successful, however, in finding ways to cross the divides of race
and ethnicity, class, and cultural background, especially for those who do not
view education in these terms and who may be disengaged from academic
and school-supported norms. Some new teachers admitted frustration with
students who did not share the value they placed on education.
When they asked for help from mentors with “classroom management,”
they seemed instead to be asking for support in dealing with diversity issues
rather than guidance in controlling their students. Over time, their preoccu-
pation with classroom management dissipated as they established a more
natural rapport with students based on deepening understanding of who
their students were and how best to motivate them. Success in making these
connections and getting to know students well regularly surfaced as “a huge
part of my job satisfaction,” as one teacher put it. She commented that
she believed her growing ability to forge relationships with her students
“correlates with their achievement.”
Nevertheless, many of our subjects also commented about how test prepa-
ration had crowded out opportunities to tailor their teaching to students’ needs.
They resented the growing emphasis, even in middle schools, on “this one
day, this one chance, to prove their eighth grade worthiness.” Those who had
chosen to teach at the middle school level to avoid what they presumed were
worse pressures of high-stakes testing at the high school level now expressed
bitterness with a system in which so much testing occurred, especially in
younger grades. They lamented the ways in which testing seemed to define
in a single measure the quality of the students to whom they were devoting
their professional lives: “It’s frustrating sometimes when people outside my
school see my kids solely in terms of their test scores. One test doesn’t
show all that much. I want people to see how great my students are.”
Professional and Personal Development

Teaching is not formulaic. There is not one way to teach. Assuming so is fool-
hardy. A scripted curriculum stifles a teacher’s creativity. How are we supposed
to teach students to develop their own voices or to think outside the box if we,
the teaching community, are prohibited from doing just that? Teaching is an
evolutionary process. Teachers develop over time, through exploring the craft,
learning from one another, and trying new and unique methods to get their
ideas across. Teachers need to have that freedom to explore their craft.
An English teacher
Growing professionally as well as personally requires exercising judgment,

making mistakes, and learning from them. In the context of scripted lessons
and mandated curriculum, even somewhat more experienced teachers
lamented the shrinking space in their schools for the decision making they
felt necessary for personal and professional growth. One put it starkly, “I do
not appreciate being transformed into an automaton.”
They especially admired principals who created schools that were well
run and democratically governed. They believed that good principals provided
space for decision making and helped mitigate rather than enforce the pressures
and frustrations brought about by the new regime of accountability. They
welcomed mentors and administrators who helped them “feed their students’
hunger for knowledge,” while providing them with the means and opportunity
to develop their own teaching philosophies and practices.
According to our interview subjects, there appear to be two issues with
mentoring: First, in many schools, there are simply not enough experienced
and effective mentors. Second, mentoring can be misguided. Some mentors
focus their efforts on enforcing the regimen of scripted lessons and evaluating
the degree of compliance with these protocols. Under pressure from the edu-
cational hierarchy, mentors, supervisors, and administrators may interpret
their role as enforcing mandates that frequently go against their own and
their teachers’ best instincts. Many of our participants reported that support
from district offices was negative, consisting of one or several supervisors
arriving unannounced in the classroom to see that desks were arranged in a
certain way, blackboards and bulletin boards conformed to prescriptions, the
lesson was the mandated one for that day, and the curriculum was “covered”
and taught in the prescribed way. In other environments, however, our subjects
report that mentors, administrators, and teachers conspire to override and
subvert mandated test-driven curricula, as well as to appropriate and modify
the elements in scripted lessons they deem beneficial for their students.
Our interview subjects welcomed strong leadership. In fact, they were
particularly keen on having principals who would make the tough decisions
about removing disruptive students from their classrooms. When poor leader-
ship led to chaos in their schools, they often considered moving elsewhere,
526 Urban Education
finding the lack of good leadership inimical to everything else they are trying
to accomplish through their work. But they complained just as often about
leadership that was overly rigid, about mentors who simply towed the party
line on pacing their curriculum or sticking to the scripted lesson. In their
eyes, these misguided efforts at improving student achievement would
ultimately backfire, driving away just the sorts of teachers necessary for
connecting to students, motivating them, and providing the pathway to true
and meaningful education.
Discussion
In some NYC schools, successful teaching has come to be defined as

faithful devotion to the prescribed coverage of mandated curriculum or dutiful
replication of scripted lessons. A consistent theme across the interviews we
conducted with beginning teachers was the degree to which they found such
conditions oppressive, especially where the leadership or mentors available
to them felt compelled to promote rigid adherence to the narrowed curriculum
and pedagogy necessary to cover the curriculum. The critical factors influ-
encing their decisions about staying or leaving reduce to a calculation
concerning (a) finding space for creativity and autonomy so as to allow for
(b) personal and professional growth, which depends, in part, on (c) forging
meaningful relationships with students.
Problems with scripted lessons are more pronounced at the middle school
and in ELA classes where the teaching fellows worked. In these cases, begin-
ning teachers received mentoring and a master’s degree in education in return
for their agreement to teach in the most challenging schools in NYC. In those
cases, many of them (who were often career changers) found the scripted
lessons oppressive and insulting to their developing sense of professionalism.
Similar teacher frustration with scripted lessons has also been documented
for teachers in a large California district, where, it was reported, “teachers
in schools with the highest proportion of students from low-income
backgrounds—a situation that historically has presented daunting instructional
challenges—were more constrained than their colleagues at more affluent
schools” (Ogawa, Sandholtz, Martina-Flores, & Scribner, 2003, p. 166).
In other places, similar difficulties with scripted lessons have been documented
for literacy teachers (Pease-Alvarez & Samway, 2005) and teachers of ELA,
math, science, and social studies (Mathison & Freeman, 2003).
The impact of narrowed prescriptions of curriculum on teacher retention
varies, as one might assume from previous research into the implementation
of educational reforms on teachers (Fuhrman, 1999; Spillane, 1999). The

factors influencing the impact of curriculum narrowing on teacher retention
in our study depended on the route taken into teaching (whether through
alternative or traditional pathways); grade level at which our subjects were
teaching; and quality of leadership in the school. As we have indicated,
despite expressed frustration with the narrowing of curriculum and pedagogy,
traditionally prepared teachers seemed to be able to devise strategies for
their students and themselves that kept them working in urban schools.
Teachers prepared through the alternative route, who taught in middle
schools with administrators and mentors who placed great pressure on them
to follow the scripted and narrowed curriculum rigidly, seemed less able
to forge a satisfying practice. It was more common for them to leave city
schools or teaching entirely.
In terms of mentoring, it is important to note that our subjects clamored
for support, but support of a different order—one that would provide them
with a better understanding of their students, with suggestions for how to
motivate and relate to their students, and with ideas that would increase their
capacity for becoming skillful and knowledgeable professionals. Such
professional development is often at risk in climates emphasizing high-stakes
testing (Boardman & Woodruff, 2004). These beginning teachers expressed
their needs along these lines somewhat differently, depending on their route
of entry into teaching: Some called for more course work in diversity; others,
for better classroom management skills; still others, for mentors who could
mediate the cultural divides they confronted. Among those calling for greater
freedom in the classroom, it was typically because they found the prescribed
curriculum and pedagogy inadequate for achieving the kind of educational
outcomes they desired for their students, typically more ambitious than
success at the Regents tests. These individuals tended to be those prepared
through traditional teacher education programs. Recent research on the differ-
ences in pathways into teaching in New York State seems to confirm variable
long-term outcomes for those entering through traditional and nontraditional
avenues (Boyd et al., 2006).
Formal mentoring programs have been shown to dramatically improve
participants’ attitudes, feelings of efficacy and control, and the varieties of
instructional strategies used in mentees’ classrooms (Harris, 2004; Huling-
Austin, 1992; Watlington et al., 2004). Good mentoring programs might go
far in addressing the needs of these new teachers, but we are not optimistic
about the realistic prospects for establishing such programs on a widespread
basis in NYC. It also became clear in these interviews that teachers were
looking for help from their mentors in allowing them space to develop
professional identities consonant with their evolving personal identities.
528 Urban Education
To the degree that these two aims worked at cross-purposes, we found, like
Rex and Nelson (2004), teachers experiencing conflict and dissatisfaction
with what was being demanded of them by their school leaders and mentors.
Mentors from the public university working with the teaching fellows
report having their roles reduced to limiting the damages incurred by scripted
lessons and mandated curricula and assisting the fellows in crafting some
very limited opportunities for authentic professional work. The dilemmas
faced by these college-appointed mentors in helping students and graduates
navigate the culture of accountability echo those reported by other teacher
educators (Sutton, 2004). However, given the role of mentors in enforcing
district policies and the reality that secondary teachers’ job satisfaction is
strongly associated with school climate (Riehl & Sipple, 1996), the mentoring
program may simply exacerbate the working conditions many new teachers
find objectionable.
The situation described here may be unique to NYC, where the scale of
the problem and the draconian nature of the perceived “remedies” to low
levels of student achievement create situations in which teachers find it
more difficult than in other school districts to gain job satisfaction (see e.g.,
the different situations described by Grant, 2000, 2003; Rex & Nelson, 2004).
We sometimes encounter skepticism from educational researchers when we
describe our findings. They seem to believe that the problems lie with the
new teachers and not with the system mandating a narrowed curriculum and
pedagogical approaches.
It is certainly conceivable that in some cases, the problems do lie with
teachers rather than the conditions in which they work, but we do not think
this is true across the board. These new teachers were all competent students
in our teacher education programs; they are intelligent, hardworking, and
committed to urban schools. Some of them had successful careers in other
fields before beginning teaching. The problems they describe are pervasive,
and the themes articulated around issues of autonomy, lack of proper support,
and frustration with the narrowing of curricular and pedagogical options
so widely shared that we do not believe them to be idiosyncratic symptoms
of underprepared or immature new teachers. Instead, we believe that the
problems reflect a system that has been established to make schooling
“teacher proof” in a misguided effort to increase student achievement on
high-stakes tests. Although we believe that urban schools in general need
improvement, we find it highly improbable that the approach being taken
at this time in NYC will yield the expected improvement.
Some researchers have argued that there are two different developmental
paths for new teachers depending on whether they work in a better or poorer
district (Achinstein, Ogawa, & Speiglman, 2004; Johnson, Kardos, Kauffman,

Liu, & Donaldson, 2004). We have found a more complex picture in NYC
where at least three patterns characterize the responses of new teachers to
the culture of accountability: First, in those schools in which the pressures
are felt most superficially, new teachers voice their objections to scripted
lessons and test-driven curriculum but, with the support of “laissez-faire”
leadership, manage to adopt the posture expressed by one middle school
teacher, “Our students are highly literate; we’re ignoring the Regents here.”
A second pattern emerges in schools where, for various reasons, the admin-
istration promotes compliance with the high-stakes testing regimen. In such
circumstances, a few new teachers towe the line, for fear of retribution or
support of some features of the new system, whereas others speak about
subverting the requirements. One subject talked proudly about his mastery
of scripted lessons, “It’s funny because last year 90% of the work I did was
my own stuff . . . I have more success when I really just tweak what they
give me.” Finally, in a small set of cases new teachers find these conditions
intolerable and leave teaching in city schools or the profession altogether.
One ELA teacher commented, “A lot of good teachers [are] leaving in direct
response to standardized testing . . . in schools that serve lower-income
kids, where it’s not just sort of a given that they’re going to pass these tests.”
Most remarkably, perhaps, given the many difficult stories we heard
from beginning teachers, we can, nevertheless, report that many of the new
teachers we interviewed are still teaching in NYC, even though many of them
have changed jobs several times in the last 5 years within the city, typically
in search of a better environment for fulfilling their goals as teachers. When
others left urban schools, they did so reluctantly, having exhausted all
possible remedies for creating a satisfying personal teaching practice.
Conclusion
In this article, we have suggested that a set of unintended consequences of

the accountability movement in NYC’s public schools may be the narrowing
of curriculum and pedagogy, particularly in ELA and social studies at the
middle and high school levels. Although the difficulties associated with
narrowing of the curriculum may be particularly acute in New York, we
know that this phenomenon exists elsewhere (Dillon, 2006; Manzo, 2005).
New teachers believe this regimen undermines the little control they have
over their teaching practice, personal and professional growth, and their ability
to develop relationships with students. We agree with Boote (2006) that
530 Urban Education
“Developing innovative professional discretion should be the long-term goal

of teacher development and curriculum policy” (p. 468). We see very little
evidence of this sort of approach in the schools of NYC.
Clearly, some new teachers are resilient in the face of such conditions
but others find that test pressures, scripted lessons, and mandated curriculum
are the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back. They leave city schools
seeking an opportunity to develop their teaching in settings that provide
greater scope for creating curriculum and pedagogy that are more satisfying
and that stimulate meaningful educational achievement in their students.
Such schools are typically ones in which the stakes are not so high in terms
of student failure on standardized tests. These settings offer teachers more
manageable goals in achieving what the accountability movement currently
considers “success” while not detracting from their ability to exercise a
measure of autonomy and control in their professional lives.
Highly qualified new teachers chafe at the diminished control they have
over their classrooms, which erodes one of the only arenas in which they
experience opportunities for decision making in a field in which teachers
have little control (Ingersoll, 2003b). Those who face mandated curriculum
and narrowed pedagogical options become most frustrated by their lack of
control, especially when they work in schools with high degrees of failure
on the Regents tests. All of this is not to imply that other issues such as
crumbling school buildings, low pay, long hours, life issues, or the difficulties
associated with working under the NYC Department of Education play no
role in these new teachers’ decisions about where they will teach or if they
will remain in the profession. However, as Ingersoll and Smith (2003) wisely
point out, improving working conditions in schools can go a long way toward
improving school retention.
In conclusion, this research has contributed the voices of beginning urban
teachers in ELA and social studies to policy debates about who stays and
leaves NYC schools. It has emphasized the role played by working conditions,
especially the narrowing of curriculum and pedagogy as a result of the high-
stakes testing movement, in undermining the autonomy and creativity of
teachers, their ability to forge positive relationships with their students, and
their personal and professional development. To a certain extent, the conditions
described here may be more intensified in NYC than elsewhere; we do not
believe the situation is unique to NYC. Thus, we hope this article offers
perspectives that will stimulate further research in other districts large and
small across the country about the effects of the age of accountability on
beginning teachers.
Postlude
We did test prep and still it wasn’t enough for our students to do well on the
test. . . . Some of the external political factors continue to be really frustrating,
like not feeling as teachers that we are treated as professionals. . . . The
rumors I’ve heard are that a lot of good teachers are leaving in direct response
to standardized teaching, especially in schools that serve lower-income kids
where it’s not just sort of a given that they’re going to pass these tests. And
my kids are going to suffer; they’re already starting to drop out more. It just
makes me so angry and so infuriated.
A social studies teacher
Notes
1. Balanced literacy attempts to combine student-centered reading and writing with
elements of phonics, vocabulary, and other direct instruction. The New York City (NYC)
Department of Education Web site (2004) provides specific guidelines for teachers engaged in
a balanced literacy approach along the following lines: (a) to provide at least one ½ hr per day
for independent reading; (b) to provide at least one ½ hr per day for children to do writing;
(c) to provide systematic phonemic awareness, phonics, spelling, and word study instruction;
(d) to provide several 10 min-long mini-lessons [sic] of explicit and direct reading and writing
instruction; (e) to provide coaching in individual and small group conferences; (f) to offer
reading aloud to students several times per day; and (g) to include shared reading of a common
text (Department of Education, NYC, 2004, www.nycboe.net)
2. Participants in roughly half these schools also report the use of a “noise meter” to
determine when student involvement with a scripted lesson is getting too loud.
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The Narrowing of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the Age of

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>> Version of Record - Oct 26, 2007

in the Age of Accountability

Under the curricular and pedagogical impositions of scripted lessons and

Keywords: curriculum narrowing; teacher attrition; NCLB

P revious research (Kauffman, Johnson, Kardos, Liu, & Peske, 2002)

Accountability, New York Style

these schools emphasizes preparation for workforce participation. Balanced

a physical room arrangement involving grouped desks, work stations, learning

The juxtaposition here of two subjects in the NYC curriculum provides

In light of the fact that we believe teaching to be intensely personal work,

occasions. Participants had anywhere from months to several years of teaching

cohorts. Overall, participants from the public university tended to be working

desks in my classroom. I am told how to tell my students to quiet down (there

them for devising personal solutions to problems encountered in their

Looking for Support for Creativity and Autonomy

The literature in social psychology reports that the positive relationship

I am told that I must have certain artifacts in my classroom. I am told how to

Although this level of regimentation is not a new phenomenon in poor

teachers’ prodigious efforts at preparing students for Regents exams, many

Forging Meaningful Relationships With Students

MetLife, 2005), they consider the development of caring personal relation-

Professional and Personal Development

Growing professionally as well as personally requires exercising judgment,

In some NYC schools, successful teaching has come to be defined as

of educational reforms on teachers (Fuhrman, 1999; Spillane, 1999). The

district (Achinstein, Ogawa, & Speiglman, 2004; Johnson, Kardos, Kauffman,

In this article, we have suggested that a set of unintended consequences of

“Developing innovative professional discretion should be the long-term goal

Ingersoll, R. M. (2003a). Is there really a teacher shortage? A report co-sponsored by

Margaret S. Crocco is professor of social studies and education at Teachers College,

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