Under a series of actions taken over the past year and a half by the New York State Board of Regents, the body that oversees P-12 education, higher education, and teacher certification, the doors have been opened for nonuniversity programs to prepare teachers at the graduate-degree level. Additionally, the first new graduate school of education in half a century has been approved, and financing has been awarded to a variety of “clinically rich” pilot preparation programs at traditional schools of education.
One of the most progressive moves the Board has taken is to give the American Museum of Natural History the authority to prepare secondary-level science teachers. Beginning next summer, participants in the program will earn their master’s degrees and be eligible for initial teacher certification. “Our role in science education and working with schools has become increasingly formal,” says museum President Ellen V. Futter, “There is a crisis in science education, and we have felt it incumbent on us, given the resources we have and the leverage we have, to play a prominent role in addressing that.”
The museum’s program includes a yearlong student-teaching apprenticeship in schools, and puts special emphasis on ensuring the candidates not only know science content, but also participate in the scientific process: they are required to work alongside scientists during one part of the program.
In addition to the museum program, the Board has also approved a new graduate school to train teachers: the Relay School of Education. This program focuses on the inculcation of specific teaching techniques and strategies, and in order to graduate candidates must demonstrate during student teaching that they helped their students gain at least a year’s worth of learning. Furthermore, rather than requiring the “usual” series of three-credit-hour courses, Relay focuses on 60 competencies that students must master.
Investments in traditional teacher prepration programs have also been made. Lehman College in the Bronx received a grant to support stipends for students enrolled in a fifth-year teaching-residency program. Grant money will also be used to assist the recruitment of ethnically diverse teacher candidates with high GPAs from the community in which they will serve.
On the teacher assessment side, New York is also in the beginning stages of tying a series of teacher assessments to its tiered-certification system. The new system will require all teachers to pass performance exams and demonstrate their impact on student learning (using a value-added metric) in order to receive a professional certificate.
To read more, please visit http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/08/05/37ny.h30.html?tkn=MPNFEukVrd8LYQf5D4%2ByFc%2FuTC38ESNqYcny&cmp=clp-edweek
