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Today, little is known collectively about the opinions and experiences of top performing teachers because researchers rarely focus specifically on them. Here’s a new study that does.

The Perspectives of Irreplaceable Teachers from TNTP (formerly The New Teacher Project) is a detailed survey of responses from 117 of America’s best teachers, as the report describes them. They represent 36 states and all 10 of the nation’s largest school districts. Together, these teacher have won almost every major teaching award in the country.

The survey was not scientific, its authors say. Rather, it was intentionally unscientific: By design, the respondents are a non-representative sample of the profession. The goal was simply to gather opinions from celebrated teachers about their work, their profession and the major policy issues facing their schools. Even with a small sample size, they raise important questions and present ideas that merit deeper exploration by policymakers.