Ellen Moir Receives Prestigious Harold W. McGraw Prize in Education Award

September 27 , 2005
New York City Library, New York City

The prestigious Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Prize in Education has been awarded  to Ellen Moir, Executive Director of the New Teacher Center. This award recognizes outstanding individuals who have dedicated themselves to improving education in this country and whose accomplishments are making a difference today.

"From creating standards for model early childhood education systems to establishing support programs for new teachers, the 2005 McGraw Prize winners have brought necessary attention to what is at the foundation of successful efforts to educate our nation’s children."

Harold McGraw III
Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer
McGraw- Hill Companies

Preparing teachers for success through teacher preparation, induction, and support has been the focus of Ellen Moir at the New Teacher Center for the past 18 years.

Founded in 1998 the New Teacher Center provides an engaging environment where educators and researchers study, develop, and administer new teacher and administrator support programs. Her work with organizations, educational leaders and policy makers worldwide has led the NTC in its vision to implement and support high quality induction programs.

"Support early in a teacher's career makes all the difference for new teachers. We know that teacher quality is the single most important factor in student success," said Ms. Moir.  “Students will achieve better, teachers will stay on the job longer, and districts will move forward successfully to serve ALL students when quality induction models are the rule rather than the exception."

The work of the New Teacher Center has been shown to improve the retention rate of new teachers. Nationally, the dropout rate among new teachers is 50 percent after five years, compared to retention rates as high as 88 percent among participants in the New Teacher Center's Induction  Model.

The NTC Induction Model provides regular, one-on-one mentoring by a carefully selected and highly trained mentor as the central element. Additional components are designed to create a network of support for both the new teacher and the mentor, and to align the induction model with other key initiatives in both the preservice and school site/district contexts. Furthermore, the model is intentionally designed to serve as a catalyst and support for educational reform and the professionalization of teaching. As stated by Harold W. McGraw III:

 "This year’s McGraw Prize recipients show us that support early on—be it for pre-schoolers or beginning teachers—is the key to sustained success," said Mr. McGraw.  "They have brought academic innovation as well as a tireless focus to student and teacher preparation and ultimately have made an important difference in the way we educate our children."