Jenny DeMonte of the Center for American Progress has penned a new report that calls for teacher-training programs to be more closely aligned with those organizations that actually hire and professionally develop the teachers that make such a crucial difference in the academics and lives of students.
Everyone agrees that teacher quality is important and that every student deserves competent-and ideally, excellent-instruction. We say it over and over again because it is true: Having a good teacher can improve the life of a student far beyond school. But then comes the hard question: How do we make sure that every student has a good teacher and receives high-quality instruction? If we wanted to begin somewhere, that starting point might be to align the work of teacher preparation with the needs of K-12 schools and students. The challenge, however, is that for the most part the institutions governing teacher-training organizations are not governed by the bodies charged with overseeing K-12 public education.
The problem centers around “getting those at the helm of these two separate but interconnected systems—K-12 schools and higher education—to talk to each other, [a fact that] is often challenging because in most states each system is regulated and governed by different authorities that aren’t required to share or collaborate to improve education for children.”
The report suggests that some states are closer to getting it right. New York is one of those states:
New York state’s educational activities in both K-12 and higher education are united in a single department—The New York State Education Department—which is governed by the Board of Regents, a group of 17 members, known as regents, who are elected by the state legislature. The regents govern the state Office of P-12 Education, the Office of Higher Education, the Office of the Professions—which includes all state-regulated licensing for professions—as well as several other organizations. The regents also appoint the commissioner of education—currently John B. King, Jr.—to act as the chief administrative officer for the state Department of Education. This unusual arrangement allows for the regents to have authority over independent elementary, secondary, and postsecondary institutions, as well as all public institutions.
Rather than conclude with a single model that she hopes would be adopted by all states, DeMonte accepts that different models could work, provided that model ensures that “institutions that prepare teachers work closely with institutions that will ultimately hire those teachers.” If this happens, “everyone in the system will be better served—especially the schoolchildren whose futures depend on great teachers.”
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