Memphis Math Collaborative

 

INTRODUCTION

Expanding Impact | Driving Results | Power in Partnership

In 2022, the Teach Like a Champion team sought to expand our international impact through the founding of our Consulting and Partnerships Team. Our team’s mission is to provide top-tier consulting services to educational organizations, grounded in supporting organizations with actualizing their strategic priorities while leveraging our team’s collective expertise and resources from Teach Like a Champion’s catalog of research, texts, videos, and artifacts.

The Memphis School Leader Collaborative was one of our team’s first partnership endeavors. Our primary objective was to create a space in which leadership teams from high-capacity schools within the Memphis community convene to study and implement effective instructional and school leadership practices in an area of opportunity. For the last four years, we have been honored to help leaders define their instructional priorities and vision to accelerate their organizations’ progress towards achieving them.

Tennessee SCORE names a key driver of this progress has been the Memphis School Leader Collaborative (MSLC), where Teach Like a Champion has worked alongside eight charter networks to strengthen school leadership and instruction. Through that partnership, schools aligned around best practices for lesson planning, delivery, and daily use of student data, building a shared foundation for instructional coherence and data-driven teaching. The findings show that 70% of participating schools improved math performance from 2023-24 to 2024-25, and more than half gained five points or more. This pattern reflects the strong impact of TLAC-aligned instructional models when schools use them consistently across classrooms and grade levels. Just as importantly, the results suggest that clear, shared definitions of strong instruction and systematic planning can produce measurable, replicable improvement. Together, the evidence points to a durable approach: when educators align around common materials, common language, and common routines, student learning accelerates at scale.

 

KEY FINDINGS

Eight Networks  | Eighteen Campuses | Over 6,400 students impacted in Memphis

The Memphis School Leader Collaborative has achieved scalable impact in math instruction and performance across 18 campuses within 8 charter networks in Memphis. In 2022, we started our collaborative with 9 campuses within 8 networks and reached 647students. And in 2024-25, our team’s work impacted more than 6,400 students. As the Tennessee SCORE Report shows, our team is proud to celebrate our impact on Memphis charter students’ performance in math:

  • “In 2021, during the first state assessment window following pandemic school closures, only 8% of Memphis charter students scored proficient on the Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP) grade 3-8 math assessments, trailing their non-charter district peers by eight percentage points. Four years later, that gap was erased; Memphis charter students now outperform their district peers, reaching 26% proficiency compared to 24% for non-charter students.”
    TN SCORE REPORT

This report features two of our current Memphis School Leader Collaborative partners: Leadership Prep and Memphis Rise. Their results include:

  • “In just two years, elementary and middle school math proficiency increased by over 20 and 30 percentages points, respectively.” (Leadership Prep)
  • “Ranked in the top 25% of all schools statewide for math proficiency.” (Memphis Rise)
  • “[Leadership Prep and Memphis Rise] outperformed statewide averages in math, vastly outperformed local district averages.”
    TN SCORE REPORT

 

See more coverage in this related Chalkbeat Article: Memphis charter students are bucking district math trends. Here’s what’s guiding their growth. 

 

 

WHAT YOU WON’T SEE IN THE REPORT

Replicable Lesson Delivery Models | Collaboration and Connection | Rapid Leadership Development

Behind the gains is a replicable Lesson Delivery Model that helps teachers consistently deliver high-quality instruction and respond effectively to student misconceptions through strategies like Error Analysis and Re-Modeling. You won’t see leaders coaching lesson preparation, observing classrooms, providing feedback, and monitoring implementation through a continuous Teacher Development Cycle. Nor will you see the collaborative learning communities where educators study practice together, share bright spots, problem-solve challenges, and learn from one another.

See clip below of Rebecca Olivarez stamping the purpose of practice labs.

 

 

ARTIFACTS

TDC in action. Evan and his anchor teacher, Ms. Martinez, attended an MSLC Instructional Leader Training (ILT) on review and remediation. A key component of the session was deliberate practice, a cornerstone of Phase 1: Train Your Teacher in Teach Like a Champion’s Teacher Development Cycle (TDC).

 

Back at their school, Evan and Ms. Martinez used Benchmark 3 data and the review and remediation protocol they learned during MSLC’s Instructional Leadership Team session to develop a targeted reteach plan using the school planning template Evan created during MSLC Coach Professional Development.

 

 

Ms. Martinez created this student work packet using the Review and Remediation One-Pager’s Re-Model guidance and the planning she completed alongside her coach, Evan, during PLC.

 

Here is a clip of Ms. Martinez teaching the reteach lesson with her students.

 

TESTIMONTIALS

“MSLC has been one of the most impactful academic investments in our portfolio and represents what is possible when expertise is paired with true partnership and support between providers, schools, and funders. The program has underpinned our collective vision of improving math academic outcomes for students in Memphis with its highly effective and efficient train-the-trainer model. Not only does this model allow us to reach more schools and provide more students with access to quality math instruction that is curriculum agnostic, but it is also highly sustainable once schools have embedded the systems taught in MSLC within their infrastructure. We also recognize how critical the on-the-ground work that the MSLC team has provided to Memphis school leaders, especially in terms of coaching and implementation support, which has led to such strong outcomes for schools in our portfolio.”
Binh Doan, Memphis Education Fund Director of Finance & Strategy 

“This year’s MSLC has been hands down some of the best PD I have received in my role! The combination of PD and practice labs, check-ins, leader-to-leader collaborative time, site visits, and other supports have allowed me to make sure my teachers are on the right path to success. It has been so valuable to see classrooms of teachers outside of my school who are all working together on the same focus area.”
MSLC Participant

 

GRATITUDE

Our incredible team of passionate colleagues and consultants make this possible. We celebrate the dedication and resilience of our colleagues Rebecca Olivarez, Jasmine Howard Adams, Joaquin Hernandez, Teneicesia White, and Jack Vuylsteke. Their innovation and inspiration have propelled our work forward in Memphis and beyond!

 

PARTNERSHIP INTEREST FORM

Interested in partnering with the Teach Like a Champion team or learning more? Please fill out our Partnership Interest Form, and we will reach out to you soon!