In 1999 Lowell Milken introduced TAP™: The System for Teacher and Student Advancement to an audience more than a thousand strong of award-winning educators and policymakers. Today, TAP is regarded as the largest multi-year, multi-state effort to create performance-based teacher and principal compensation systems—ever, now impacting 200,000 students and 20,000 teachers in 13 states as it grows exponentially.
The Inception of TAP
After two decades of work in K12 education at the Milken Family Foundation, including the creation of the Milken Educator Awards; time spent in classrooms across the country; intensive research of prior comprehensive school reform efforts; and discussions with thousands of talented educators in every setting imaginable, in the mid 1990’s Lowell Milken began work to find a comprehensive way to address the K-12 system that was failing to provide children with the sound education they need and deserve.
At the time, American K-12 education was constrained by two opposing and contentious positions on how the system should be reformed. On the one hand were those so vested in the existing K-12 system that they were unwilling to effect systemic education reform. On the other were those so dispirited by the current system that they were preparing to abandon it altogether and build something entirely new.
It was clear that neither approach was producing results as the U.S. public K-12 system saw little to no improvement in student achievement since the 1960’s. Against the backdrop of a burgeoning knowledge-based economy creating huge competition for well-educated workers, American education was not only failing to attract and retain enough talented people to the profession, but was actually discouraging them from becoming educators by failing to:
Instead, what Lowell Milken saw was an American K-12 education system that was reinforcing the belief that teaching was an off-ramp from opportunity. What was needed was a new strategy, one that would both honor the essence of the profession, yet changed its structure.
A New Direction for Success
To create this strategy, Lowell Milken and his colleagues devised a comprehensive, multi-tierd system that addressed the fundamental element for success in any endeavor –attaining, developing, retaining and motivating human capital. Through his business career, it was evident to Lowell Milken that the knowledge, skills and experiences of people were the decisive factor in achieving success; in education, the same principle applied. Over the years, research has proven that the most important school-related factor driving student achievement is the quality of the teacher in the classroom.
A system was needed that provided:
How and Why TAP works
That system, TAP, allows teachers to pursue a variety of positions throughout their careers — career, mentor and master teacher — depending upon their interests, abilities and accomplishments; it provides teachers with a system of professional development that is ongoing, job-embedded, collaborative, student centered and led by expert instructors; it utilizes a comprehensive system for evaluating teachers that rewards them for how well they teach their students; and changes the current pay system by providing additional compensation to teachers based on new roles and responsibilities, their accomplishments in the classroom and the performance of their students.
The TAP system:
Over the past 12 years, TAP has been able to lay the foundation for a new tradition of excellence by transforming K12 education to do right by America’s youth while establishing teaching as a profoundly respectable profession.
Lowell Milken Presents Steven Gamache With Milken Award in New Orleans
Jennifer Williams Surprised with Louisiana Milken Educator Award
2019 Lowell Milken Founder's Award Goes to Wildflower School in Goodyear, AZ
STEM Teacher Nichole Anderson Receives Milken Educator Award
2010-19 Missouri Milken Educator Therese Shain Shares Big News
Angie Beavin wins Milken Educator Award in Kentucky
Erica Stephens Accepting 2018 Tenneesee Milken Educator Award
Oklahoma Kindergarten Teacher Hailey Couch Wins 2018 Milken Award
Kansas 2018 Milken Educator Award Recipient Linda Dishman
West Goshen Elementary School Named 2018 TAP Founder's Award Recipient
Teacher Theresa Cross Surprised with Milken Educator Award
Principal Debreon Davis Wins Milken Educator Award
Katherine Watkins Surprised with Milken Educator Award
Knoxville Teacher Paula Franklin Receives Milken Educator Award
Lisa Rodgers Announced as this year's Colorado Milken Educator Award Recipient
Lowell Milken's James Bryant Conant Award Acceptance Speech
Lowell Milken Congratulates 2015 Milken Educator John Lary
Lowell Milken Speaks at 2015 Chapman University Commencement
Lowell Milken with Students at Friendly House Academia del Pueblo Elementary Charter School
Lowell Milken Keynote Address at 2017 TAP Conference
Felicia Casto wins Milken Educator Award at Rim Rock Elementary
Lowell Milken Speaks with Students at East End Prep in Nashville, TN
Ryan James Presented with 2017 Milken Educator Award in Richmond, Virginia
Lowell Milken, Tom Torlakson and Wayne Jospeh at 2017 Milken Educator Award Presentation
Lowell Milken Accepts 2017 James Bryant Conant Award
Media Interviews at Devon Willis-Jones Milken Educator Awards Assembly