A small group of Boston Public School teachers met for a year to explore the question of what keeps teachers going, a question that bears asking because of the precarious situation of public education today. In this article, I describe the work of the What Keeps Teachers Going? inquiry group as a way to challenge current notions of what it means to be a “highly qualified teacher” as defined in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. Rather than “best practices” or prescribed pedagogy, we found that a combination of interrelated conditions and values keep excellent teachers going, including love, autobiography, hope, anger, intellectual work, and the ability to shape the future. This article ends with implications for professional development and a call for new national priorities in public education.
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