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Dec 29, 2006

"I believe you have something invaluable - the perspective that comes from inexperience. The world needs your inexperience. It needs you before you accept the status quo, before you are plagued by the knowledge of what is impossible." --Wendy Kopp

Inspiring Story Behind Teach For America

Wendy Kopp proposed starting a sort of Peace Corps for teachers in 1989 -- a program that would recruit fellow Ivy Leaguers to teach for two years in the nation's toughest schools, and got a surprising response: "My dear Ms. Kopp, you are quite evidently deranged." Today, Teach for America, as Kopp's program came to be known, is one of the most respected initiatives in American education. This June, 10 percent of the graduating class of Yale University applied to the program, which accepts only about 1 of every 8 applicants. According to a 2005 survey by an independent research firm, 75 percent of principals who were surveyed consider TFA members more effective than other beginning teachers. In a recent commencement speech, Kopp shares the inspiring guiding principles of Teach for America.