Programs Featured in What Matters Most (1996)
Recruitment Programs
School-University Partnerships
Teacher Education Programs
Recruitment Programs Featured in What Matters Most: Teaching for America's Future (1996)
Golden Apple Scholars of Illinois
Golden Apple Scholars of Illinois recruits and trains 100 promising young people into the teaching profession each year. The students are nominated during their junior year of high school and are selected during their senior year. Scholars are mentored through their college years and their first five years of teaching. For four consecutive summers, the students attend intensive summer institutes, teaching in Chicago classrooms and attending classes dealing with leading-edge education ideas. The Scholars program provides $28,000 in scholarship loans, contingent upon agreeing to teach for five years in a high-need Illinois school, and partners with 35 colleges and universities throughout Illinois. This program was created and involves participation by winners of the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching, a program that recognizes ten outstanding educators each year.
Navajo Nation/ Ford Foundation Teacher Education Program
This program is a joint effort of the Navajo Nation and the Ford Foundation, established in 1992. Since then, the Navajo Nation Teacher Education Program has expanded to serve undergraduate and graduate students who want to be teachers and educational administrators. The Navajo teachers are recruited and prepared through a consortium of thirteen colleges and universities. Participants receive financial assistance to complete their college degrees and education training part-time, with academic advisement and support. Participants in the program are Navajo-speaking teacher aides, certified Navajo teachers, and post-baccalaureate students. The goal is to help students on reservations balance their experiences and learning in both Navajo and American worlds. The project is moving to focus on recruiting more of their students into secondary level teaching, particularly in high-need areas such as science and math.
North Carolina Teaching Fellows Program
North Carolina Teaching Fellows has recruited 5600 high-ability high school graduates into teaching to date, including significant numbers of young men and teachers of color. Students agree to teach for four years in the state's public schools in exchange for a $26,000 four-year college scholarship, which underwrites their preparation. Fourteen colleges and universities in the state participate in providing intensive year-round learning experiences that extend beyond regular teacher education courses. North Carolina principals report that the Fellows far exceed other new teachers in their performance, and the Fellows themselves give high marks to the preparation they receive in instructional methods and the teaching of diverse students.
South Carolina Teacher Cadet Program
Launched in 1986, the South Carolina Teacher Cadet Program is part of the South Carolina Center for Educator Recruitment, Retention, and Advancement. The Cadet program's primary goal is to encourage academically able students who possess exemplary interpersonal and leadership skills to consider teaching as a career. Cadets enroll in a year-long course on teaching in which they study cognitive learning, child development, education history, and pedagogy. They engage in seminars, group projects, and discussions with educators. They observe classrooms, teach practice lessons, and tutor other students during an internship that simulates student teaching. Approximately 35% of Cadets enrolled for the 1999-2000 term have indicated plans to pursue gaining teaching credentials in South Carolina. Many of them have plans to teach or are teaching in high-need rural areas and in critical shortage fields.
School-University Partnerships and Collaborations Featured in What Matters Most (1996)
Coalition of Essential Schools
The Coalition of Essential Schools (CES), established in 1984 by Theodore Sizer, is a comprehensive school reform organization focused on fundamentally changing the way people think about teaching and learning. CES is a growing network of more than 1,000 elementary, middle, and high schools-97% public, 42% urban, 31% suburban, 27% rural-seeking to promote higher student achievement and to develop more nurturing school communities. The work of CES schools is supported by 19 regional centers and the CES national office located in Oakland, California. CES is guided by ten common principles, which are designed to be adapted to local needs while maintaining several bottom-line elements of successful schooling. The principles, summarized below, aim at helping all students learn to use their minds well:
- Instruction should promote active learning rather than passive absorption, and teaching should be individualized so that all students can succeed.
- Curriculum should be designed to stress depth of understanding rather than superficial coverage of material.
Students should be assessed based on active demonstration of their abilities to synthesize knowledge and to solve real-world problems.
- The school should stress a tone of decency and mutual respect, and must be designed so that each student can be known well by at least one adult.
- Families should be invited to play an active role in school life.
Schools that have successfully adopted these principles have achieved striking advances in student achievement.
International High School at LaGuardia Community College, New York City
International High School, a multicultural, alternative educational high school in New York City for recent arrivals to this country, serves students with varying degrees of limited English proficiency. A collaborative project between the New York City Board of Education and LaGuardia Community College of the City University of New York, this school offers a high school/college curriculum combining substantive study of all subject matters and intensive study and reinforcement of the English language. The mission of The International High School is to enable each student to develop the linguistic, cognitive, and cultural skills necessary for success in high school, college, and beyond.
League of Professional Schools
The League of Professional Schools is a practitioner-driven network of schools (housed in the College of Education at the University of Georgia) in which each school initiates and implements a democratic learning community that is student-oriented and focused on improving teaching and learning for all. The League works with schools to break down barriers to communication within and among schools, helping schools to study themselves and evaluate instructional goals. This is a voluntary program that uses shared governance to plan instructional initiatives; decisions are made by all members of the faculty, based on knowledge of student needs, effective instruction, community expectations, and methods and products of research. Recognized as one of the most outstanding educational collaborations in the nation, the League is a three-time recipient of the Certificate of Merit awarded by the National Business-Higher Education Forum.
Southern Maine Partnership
The Southern Maine Partnership strives to support the development of schools that fulfill the promise of public education through promoting equity for all learners now and in the future. The Southern Maine Partnership connects 35 school districts, two independent schools, two colleges, and the University of Southern Maine. It has achieved a regional, statewide, and national reputation as a center for school-based, educator-driven school reform, and as an organization that respects the professional knowledge of educators and acknowledges both their skills and the challenging conditions under which they work. At the same time, the Partnership nurtures teachers' and administrators' potential as inventors and change agents. Six Southern Maine Partnership districts host professional development schools for the University of Southern Maine Extended Teacher Education Program. Partnership activities include a variety of collaborative and professional development opportunities open to all members. Funded projects engage schools more deeply in work focused around involving teaching, learning, and assessment, school structures and leadership, and community engagement.
Teacher Education Programs Featured in What Matters Most (1996)
Bank Street College of Education
The Graduate School at Bank Street College of Education is dedicated to preparing individuals to become outstanding educators and leaders in schools, museums, and other educational settings. Based in a tradition of progressive education, the graduate programs are designed to help educators find ways to make learning vital, active, and creative for children from diverse backgrounds who come to the classroom with a broad range of learning styles. Bank Street's master's degree programs lead to New York State certification and provide graduates with a thorough, rigorous, humanistic foundation for their careers in education. Each of Bank Street's programs is characterized by small classes, a year of supervised fieldwork/advisement, and a faculty dedicated both to research and to classroom practice.
California Mathematics and Science Teacher Corps at California State University, Dominguez Hills
Created with help from businesses that provided stipends for retiring employees to prepare to teach (IBM, TRW, McDonnell-Douglas, and Hughes were among the first companies to participate), this program provides training and credentials to retired and laid-off aerospace workers interested in becoming elementary or secondary mathematics and science teachers. Students progress through the program in a peer cohort and receive specialized assessment and training based on their advanced knowledge and experience in the field. The program now receives its primary financial support from private industry councils in the Dominguez Hills service area. During their year in the program, candidates observe, tutor, and student teach in schools while taking courses in teaching methods, motivation, learning, classroom management, and multicultural perspectives. Graduates affirm that the training has been essential to their later success.
The Cincinnati Initiative for Teacher Education (CITE)
CITE is a five-year preservice teacher education program designed to graduate fully qualified teachers capable of delivering instruction to diverse student populations in a variety of settings. A collaborative effort between the school district and the University of Cincinnati, the College of Education supports the program with the educational and professional studies component, the College of Arts and Sciences provides subject-matter education in the academic disciplines, and practicing teachers in the schools serve as mentors and models. Upon completion, teachers receive a bachelor's degree in their discipline as well as a degree in education. A full-year internship during the fifth year combines half-time teaching responsibility with coordinated seminars under the joint supervision of campus-based and school-based faculty. Professional practice schools provide settings for students' field and internship placements, where they conduct observations, fieldwork, and tutoring in professional teams with other teachers, school-based university faculty, and fellow interns, who usually number six or eight to a building.
Developing Effective Leaders in Teaching at Arlington (DELTA) Secondary Teacher Education Program at George Washington University, Washington, DC
Since 1985, George Washington University's DELTA (formerly Crystal City) Secondary Teacher Education Program has been preparing retired military personnel, federal workers, managers, and technical experts from corporate settings who are seeking a career change to teaching. Originally limited to the content areas of science and mathematics, the self-paced program now serves secondary English, social studies, foreign language, art, and English as a second language. In addition to preparing graduates for licensure throughout the Washington, DC metro area, the program meets the licensure standards for most of the other states across the country. Program participants tend to be highly skilled individuals trained for various technological and specialized jobs. Delta is a technology-driven program that is fulfilling the critical need for greater numbers of highly qualified secondary school teachers.
Project Promise, Colorado State University
Project Promise is an innovative, accelerated approach to preparing post-baccalaureate, mid-career candidates to become secondary public school teachers. Founded in 1988, the program prepares teachers who are sought after by many school districts in Colorado. The program received the Program of Excellence Award from the Colorado Commission on Higher Education and has been featured in Business Week Magazine and quoted in U.S. News and World Report. In the Project Promise model, students receive instruction during a full-day schedule over ten months. The periods of instruction are immediately followed by extended field experiences in the particular contexts for which students were prepared. The approach is developmental in nature and ensures application of theory in authentic practice. Students are required to demonstrate proficiency through work samples during the five field experiences:
- rural;
- junior high/middle school;
- urban;
- senior high; and
- service learning.
Founded on the belief that public education in the U.S. will not be world class until universities develop world-class models of teacher training, Project Promise began recruiting prospective teachers from fields as diverse as law, geology, chemistry, stock trading, and medicine. The ten-month program emphasizes problem solving, cultural awareness, and student needs as well as subject matter and pedagogical preparation. Candidates cycle through four or five intensively supervised nine-week teaching practica in very different settings and take part in regular peer coaching. Evaluation is based on demonstrated performance rather than credit hours or seat time. Graduates work with faculty mentors in their first and second years of teaching, bridging the gap between preparation and induction. Project Promise has received funding to conduct research, follow up with its graduates, and provide assistance to other public institutions seeking to implement a similar model.
Professional Development Schools Partnership, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, NY
- A Partnership of Teachers College, Community School District 3, the Alternative High School Division, and the United Federation of Teachers (New York City teachers' union)
In 1988, PS 87, a 1100-student K-5 elementary school, and MS 44, a 1500-student middle school, joined forces with Teachers College, Columbia University in an urban professional development school (PDS) partnership designed to support the learning of preservice student teachers, the induction of beginning teachers, and the ongoing growth of experienced teachers while simultaneously restructuring schools and schools of education. This collaboration has since expanded to include PS 165, PS 207, and the Beacon High School [as of 1996]. Some features of the school-university partnership include a one-year internship program for preservice teachers; a school-based seminar, co-taught by PDS teachers and university faculty, focused on curriculum, materials, and classroom management; extensive action research; and a course in supervision for PS 87 cooperating teachers who have interns and student teachers in their classrooms. Central to the partnership work is a fundamental concern for students' learning and development, with a specific focus on issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion.
Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas
Since replacing its traditional, four-year education major with five years of preparation nearly ten years ago, Trinity's program integrates more arts and sciences courses with educational course work to ensure solid disciplinary grounding and attention to content pedagogy. Students receive a bachelor's degree in their academic discipline before completing a Master of Arts in Teaching. The program also adds a full-year teaching internship for student teachers, which takes place in professional development schools where expert, veteran teachers join with university faculty to provide a supportive, realistic initial teaching experience. Teachers who serve as mentors to student teachers receive an extra planning period each day to work with the beginners and to collaborate with college faculty in designing new curriculum and restructuring school practices. Outcomes of Trinity's program have been impressive. Candidates rate the program extremely highly, as do employers. Graduates are eagerly sought out, and 100% are placed in teaching positions, most in San Antonio. As a group, they are extraordinarily successful, winning numerous awards for their teaching from their very first years in the classroom. "In terms of recruiting, training, and renewing teachers, Trinity is one of the most impressive efforts in the nation," observed Ernest Boyer, the late president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
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