• A new bill has been introduced this session to reward Utah teachers who offer a robust level of openness about their classroom teaching and materials; its focus is on rewards, not mandates, for teachers.
• According to polling data, lack of time, lack of compensation from districts, and lack of parent response are among obstacles for why Utah teachers don’t share more about their curriculum with parents.
• Polling data shows a gap between how teachers perceive parent access and what they report doing themselves to give parent access.

A bill has been introduced this session that would reward Utah teachers who offer a robust level of openness about their classroom teaching and materials. It’s a uniquely different – but complementary – approach to years-long efforts to ensure parents know what students are learning.

Utah lawmakers have done a lot in recent years to ensure transparency of learning materials in schools and parent participation in district curriculum selection. A lot of that work focuses on what districts must do to provide this access.

What makes this bill novel is that it focuses on teachers – helping them, rather than mandating anything from them.

What’s in the bill?

In a nutshell, HB 325 – Parent Access to Learning Materials (PALM) Pilot Program creates a three-year pilot program in which teachers from selected local education agencies (LEAs) can receive incentives for making their learning materials more easily accessible to parents.

To receive the incentive, teachers are required to meet the “teacher qualification criteria” established by a participating LEA.

Per the bill, the teacher qualification criteria must include at least two things for a teacher to receive an incentive, including “sending regular emails to parents describing upcoming instruction, posting instructional materials to the LEA’s learning management system, providing learning management system access instructions to parents, providing links to current Utah Core Standards to be taught during the school year, posting annual instructional topics to the Learning Management System, or implementing additional parent access methods determined by the LEAs.”

What’s prudent about this policy is that many teachers likely already do these things, which is good news for families; it may now be good news for teachers in participating schools. Some teachers who don’t yet do these things may be interested in the teacher incentive offered by their district and so make those changes. For LEAs that want to beef up teacher openness with parents in unique ways, they could still come up with a method that addresses the specific needs of their classroom teachers, parents and students.

On the incentive side, participating LEAs also need to offer one or more “teacher incentive methods,” which include an annual financial stipend, additional paid professional hours, or other methods designed by the LEA.

Data from polling conducted in 2024 by Y2 Analytics shows that 46% of Utah teachers support giving teachers a $1,000 stipend for sharing the instructional materials and curriculum they use with parents, and 47% support giving teachers additional professional development days for doing so, both of which would support incentives proposed in the bill among the options.

Along with protecting local autonomy, including other “methods that the LEA designs” could also cover any number of unique incentives. For instance, the same data also showed that 46% of Utah teachers support extra employment protections for sharing this type of information with parents. Other creative ideas may be proposed by LEAs.

As a pilot program, it’s intentionally limited in scope and emphasizes data collection so lawmakers can assess its efficacy. For instance, the program will only be offered to three to five LEAs, which, in order to participate, must go through an application process created by the Utah State Board of Education.

In addition to what LEAs must decide for teacher qualification criteria and teacher incentives, LEAs must collect data regarding teacher usage of those methods prior to the start of the program as well as parent feedback. At the end of the pilot program duration, a report must be given to the Education Interim Committee that compares the before and end of program usage data as well as parent and teacher feedback.

Polling data on what’s stopping teachers from sharing more with parents

The Y2 Analytics data shed light on how teachers feel about their current level of openness with parents and the obstacles that stand in the way of sharing more.

Importantly, 14% of Utah teachers reported that they wanted to be more open with parents about their curriculum while 85% of teachers said they wanted to maintain their current level of openness with parents. What accounts for the very high percentage that said they want to maintain their current effort is not clear from the polling questions and answers. For instance, we don’t know if it’s because they feel they are already doing enough in this space. Or perhaps it’s because doing anything more adds an unreasonable burden to an already overwhelming workload.

What we do know is that the top three obstacles teachers reported that kept them from sharing more with parents were (1) “I don’t have enough time,” with 69% of Utah teachers reporting this reason, (2) “the district doesn’t compensate me for prioritizing classroom openness,” with 42% reporting this as a reason, and (3) “parents don’t respond when I try to be open with them,” with 40% reporting this as an obstacle.

A pilot program that either gives teachers additional time or money for doing this work may help the teachers who do want to improve – and maybe even those who don’t currently because these obstacles feel immovable.

We also know that individual teachers provide different levels of access to what they’re teaching. Some go above and beyond, making information easily digestible on digital platforms and in regular email communications. That’s a professional choice that deserves to be rewarded – and if so, perhaps teachers who haven’t yet made those choices will be moved to do more.

Interestingly, Y2 Analytics polling data shows that a very high percentage of teachers report feeling that parents have access to the curriculum that will be covered over the course of the school year (76% of Utah teachers report agreeing with this) and to learning materials to see what is being taught to their children in class each day (72% of them agree with this).

Yet, a smaller percentage of Utah teachers reported actually sharing with parents the full list of topics in a class before or at the beginning of the school year (52% said they do this most or all of the time) and posting instructional materials on a program such as Canvas to give parents access (61% said they do most or all of the time).

This means there’s a gap between how teachers perceive parent access and what they report doing themselves to give parents access.

Importantly, it also means that 47% of Utah teachers only sometimes, rarely or never share the full list of topics in a class before or near the beginning of the school year. It means that 40% of Utah teachers only sometimes, rarely or never post materials on something like Canvas.

There is certainly work to be done in terms of teachers helping parents access what they really teach in their classroom. Perhaps this pilot program that focuses on teacher incentives will help.