With funds made available from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, OPE documented its framework in A Grand Bargain for Education Reform: New Rewards and Supports for New Accountability. The volume was edited by Theodore Hershberg, a professor of public policy and history and director of the Center for Greater Philadelphia at the University of Pennsylvania, and director of Operation Public Education and Claire Robertson-Kraft, associate director of the Center for Greater Philadelphia and of Operation Public Education, and a former elementary school teacher.

Nationally prominent educators contributed chapters describing their respective components.

Professional Unionism. Brad Jupp, former senior academic policy advisor to Denver Public Schools and Julia Koppich, a San Francisco-based education consultant and coauthor of United Mind Workers, discuss the central elements of a professional union model and provide recommendations for implementing these changes.

Choosing a Value-Added Model. William Sanders and June Rivers, of the SAS EVAAS group at SAS Institute, Inc., provide districts with guidelines for choosing an appropriate value-added model.

Teacher Evaluation. Charlotte Danielson, an educational consultant in Princeton, New Jersey and author of a number of book supporting teachers and administrators, including Enhancing Professional Practice: A Framework for Teaching, explains how districts can create a comprehensive framework for teaching and use this framework to evaluate practice and accelerate improvement.

Administrator Evaluation. John Deasy, former superintendent of the Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland, expounds upon how evaluation mechanisms can be used to assess administrator quality and enhance school improvement efforts.

Compensation. Marc J. Wallace Jr., a founding partner of Teacher Excellence through Compensation, draws on his experience to synthesize the key principles of an effective compensation system.

Compensating Educators in the Absence of Value-Added Assessment. Virginia Adams Simon, a lecturer and policy analyst at the University of California, Davis provides districts with recommendations and options for how to include teachers in nontested subjects in pay-for-performance models.

Integrated Assessment. Margaret Jorgensen, CEO of Measure2Learn, LLC and former president for product research and innovation at Harcourt Assessment, discusses how districts can design an assessment system that meets these criteria.

Value-Added as a Diagnostic. Joel Giffin, the former principal of Maryville Middle School in Maryville, Tennessee and an educational consultant, explains the innovative model he developed to use value-added assessment in his school.

Value-Added Training. James Mahoney, executive director, Michael Thomas, senior director of innovative solutions, and Jacquelyn Asbury, education consultant, of Battelle for Kids, discuss strategies for implementing value-added training.

Mentoring and New Teacher Induction. Ellen Moir, founder and executive director, and Patricia Martin, development associate, of the New Teacher Center based in Santa Cruz, California, discuss how districts can design and implement successful mentoring programs.

Peer Assistance and Review. John Grossman, president of the Columbus Education Association from 1978 to 2004, outlines the issues that must be given careful consideration in the design and implementation of a PAR program.

Strategic Review. Regis Anne Shields, a director at Education Resource Strategies (ERS), and Karen Hawley Miles, executive director and founder of ERS, discuss how to develop the capacity to carry out a strategic professional development review at the district level.

Communications. Sheppard Ranbom, cofounder and president of the Washington D.C. based public affairs firm, CommunicationWorks LLC, discusses the key considerations for districts interested in developing a comprehensive communication strategy.

Evaluation. Researchers at RAND – Jeffery Marshall, Laura Hamilton, Julia Marsh, Daniel McCaffrey, and Brian Stecher – outline the challenges and requirements for a thorough qualitative and quantitative evaluation of a pilot.