The Cage-Busting Teacher (Educational Innovations Series)

The Cage-Busting Teacher adopts the logic of Cage-Busting Leadership and applies it to the unique challenges and opportunities of classroom teachers. Detailed, accessible, and thoroughly engaging, it uncovers the many ways in which teachers can break out of familiar constraints in order to influence school and classroom practice, education policy, and school reform. "Cage-busting is concrete, precise, and practical," writes Frederick M. Hess. This invaluable book helps teachers understand why and how to revisit their assumptions and enables them to have greater impacts upon their schools and beyond.

Based on interviews with hundreds of teachers, teacher advocates, union leaders, and others, Hess identifies the challenges teachers face, seeks concrete and workable solutions, and offers recommendations to put those solutions in place. A uniquely practical and inspiring book, The Cage-Busting Teacher is for educators who want to shape the schools and systems in which they work.

"The Cage-Busting Teacher is filled with practical ideas on how teachers can lead outside of the classroom to create school environments where they are free to do their best work. This book is a must-read for all teachers and school leaders."
--Rebecca Mieliwocki, 2012 National Teacher of the Year

"I loved this book--even the parts I hated. Finally someone (besides me) is talking about the power and authority of teachers, teachers, teachers! As educators, we have to reject the suggestion that 'You can't do that.' Push back, come up with your own ideas, and 96.4 percent (more or less) of the time, you'll find that you can do important things to improve schools. Such are the cage-busters. They don't accept the imaginary bars of the cage."
--Lily Eskelsen Garcia, president, National Education Association

Frederick M. Hess is Director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). An educator, political scientist and author, he studies K-12 and higher education issues. His books include The Cage-Busting Teacher, Cage-Busting Leadership, Breakthrough Leadership in the Digital Age, The Same Thing Over and Over, Education Unbound, Common Sense School Reform, Revolution at the Margins, and Spinning Wheels. He is also the author of the popular Education Week blog "Rick Hess Straight Up" and is a regular contributor to The Hill and to National Review Online. Rick's work has appeared in scholarly and popular outlets such as Teachers College Record, Harvard Education Review, Social Science Quarterly, Urban Affairs Review, American Politics Quarterly, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Phi Delta Kappan, Educational Leadership, U.S. News & World Report, USA Today, the Washington Post, the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Atlantic, and National Affairs. He has edited widely cited volumes on the Common Core, the role of for-profits in education, education philanthropy, school costs and productivity, the impact of education research, and No Child Left Behind. Rick serves as executive editor of Education Next, as lead faculty member for the Rice Education Entrepreneurship Program, and on the review board for the Broad Prize for Public Charter Schools. He also serves on the boards of directors of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers and 4.0 SCHOOLS. A former high school social studies teacher, he teaches or has taught at the University of Virginia, the University of Pennsylvania, Georgetown University, Rice University, and Harvard University. He holds an M.A. and Ph.D. in Government, as well as an M.Ed. in Teaching and Curriculum, from Harvard University.