Comment on FR Doc # 2011-10909

See attached file(s) Over the next five years, more than a million new teachers will enter public school classrooms. But the system in place to produce these teachers—supported by an ever-expanding set of federal financial aid programs and multimillion-dollar federal grants—offers no guarantees of quality for anyone involved, from the college students who often borrow thousands of dollars to attend teacher preparation programs to the districts, schools, and children that depend on good teachers. As the attached report, A Measured Approach to Improving Teacher Preparation, explains, the federal government can address this problem by pursuing a three-part strategy to improve teacher preparation. This strategy includes creating a new federal framework for assessing and improving teacher preparation programs, one that encourages accurate reporting focused on outcomes-based measures of quality. The federal government can support this outcomes-based framework by establishing a new set of competitive grants that encourage states and institutions to make ambitious changes to how, and how rigorously, they monitor, evaluate, and improve their teacher preparation programs. Finally, the federal government needs to develop a new strategy to streamline existing financial aid programs and better align those programs with current efforts to improve the quality of the teacher work force. Thank you for your attention to these comments. Sincerely, Kevin Carey Policy Director, Education Sector Erin Dillon Senior Policy Analyst, Education Sector Elena Silva Senior Policy Analyst, Education Sector