Your association wants you! Are you ready to become a leader in the national educator preparation community, or do you know someone who is? Nominate yourself or a colleague by May 8 to serve in an AACTE governance role.
AACTE is currently seeking applications from volunteers to serve on the AACTE Board of Directors and the following standing committees:
Have you seen the JTE Insider blog managed by the Journal of Teacher Education (JTE) editorial team? Check out the latest author interview below.
This interview features insights from the JTE article, “Informed and Uninformed Naïve Assessment Constructors’ Strategies for Item Selection,” written by Helenrose Fives and Nicole Barnes of Montclair State University (NJ). The article is featured in the January/February 2017 issue of JTE; you can read the article by going to this link (and AACTE members have free access through this login link).
This article originally appeared in the Winter/Spring 2017 edition of Titan Magazine and is reprinted with permission.
In light of the most recent election cycle and AACTE’s commitment to having its members and state affiliates remain connected with officials in their respective states, we have updated the lists of contact information on our website for each state’s policy makers (member login required). Contacts include that of the governor, chief school officer, relevant legislature committees, and education agency staff.
Are you coming to Tampa for the AACTE Annual Meeting, and looking for activities March 1? Please consider joining a free daylong institute exploring a variety of efforts to diversify the teaching workforce, organized by the AACTE Diversified Teaching Workforce topical action group. We’ll be in the Grand Ballroom Salon E of the Tampa Marriott Waterside starting at 8:00 a.m.
The Diversified Teaching Workforce (DTW) Institute will convene a group of national leaders at colleges and universities across the United States to spotlight and explore innovative efforts for addressing racial/ethnic teacher diversity across five key areas: recruitment and retention, teacher preparation, mentorship, induction and professional development, and advocacy. Recognizing the need to create spaces within professional networks to discuss and unpack the challenges and possibilities for increasing teacher diversity, the institute offers presentations on current research, opportunities to plan in working groups, and panel sessions focused on best practices from teacher preparation and teacher diversity pipeline leaders.
Two new videos are available this week on AACTE’s Research-to-Practice Spotlight Series highlighting the George Mason University (VA) College of Education and Human Development’s clinical preparation program. This week’s videos present partner elementary schools’ experience with having multiple teachers in the classroom and display the readiness of George Mason students after completing their 1-year internships.
The College of Education and Human Development at George Mason University (GMU) and its network of professional development schools (PDSs) benefit PK-12 student learning in several ways. Students enjoy having access to a second adult in the room dedicated to helping them succeed; teacher mentors gain new perspectives and techniques they can integrate in their classroom; and teacher candidates are prepared through a yearlong internship to hit the ground running in their own classrooms in the future.
AACTE’s enhanced online professional seminars, offered through the Quality Support Center on the FutureLearn social-learning platform, are well under way! More than 5,000 registrants signed up for the first run of our introductory assessment course, which just concluded, and the second course, Using Data to Improve Student Outcomes, opens March 20. (Please note this start date is a change from the original schedule.)
In this free 3-week course, you will discover how to apply data science to deliver better outcomes for students. Led by Linda McKee, AACTE’s senior director for quality support initiatives, you’ll learn to identify a range of data sources, analyze the data, and present your findings, then select indicators and establish actions to achieve continuous improvement.
Two new advocacy guides are now available for download in AACTE’s Advocacy Center. These handy references help you put Twitter to use as a strategic advocacy tool and develop effective relationships with the press.
These guides, available exclusively to AACTE members, join four others we’ve developed to boost your advocacy prowess. Here’s the full list of guides currently available through the federal and state pages of the Advocacy Center:
How can you unleash the power of teacher leaders to connect preservice and in-service educators … to enhance clinical partnerships between educator preparation providers and PK-12 schools … and to inform the quality of programs and practice across the continuum of teacher development? Join with peers from your region at an AACTE Quality Support Workshop to construct solutions collaboratively to these and other compelling issues around performance assessment, quality assurance, and continuous improvement.
These workshops will be offered in three regions this year: Fort Worth, Texas (April 24-26); Minneapolis, Minnesota (August 10-12), and Seattle, Washington (November 9-11). At each event, over two half days and one full day, participants will engage in interactive plenary sessions, select from a variety of topics available in break-out blocks, have dedicated time to work in teams and consult with facilitators, and enjoy networking receptions to wrap up each day. See the chart below for an overview of the draft program for the Fort Worth workshop (and visit our website for specific dates and times).
For educators and those who prepare them, sleepless nights over recent national events have unfortunately become all too frequent. The most recent public discourse regarding the confirmation of the new U.S. Secretary of Education has certainly contributed to our level of concerns. In a recent op-ed I wrote that was published in The Virginian-Pilot, “Educational Objects in the Mirror,” I asked if perhaps these events are distracting us from our real worries. As dean of the Darden College of Education at Old Dominion University (VA), I realize that what really keeps me up at night is my state and local concerns – especially the growing shortage of teachers.
The need for more teachers is a cry that I hear on a daily basis from local schools. Recently, I was aghast to find out that in my state, the Commonwealth of Virginia, elementary teachers are now included on the shortage list. Those of us in the profession recognize the significance of the state’s shortage of elementary teachers. If that group of new professionals is diminishing, we really do have some sleepless nights ahead of us.
A new report from the Teacher Education Task Force of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU) makes a compelling case for quality teacher preparation, capturing the key challenges that make the current context complex but also offering recommendations for both university leaders and policy makers to move the field forward.
The task force conducted a survey last year of presidents, provosts, and education deans at state colleges and universities to gauge the current state of educator preparation. (The survey results are included as an appendix to the new report.) The responses informed conversations among task force members to distill the core themes, debate their implications in light of the latest research, and determine consensus recommendations for priority actions by higher education administrators. The results were combined to craft the new report, and the AASCU policy team added a set of priorities for federal and state policy.
The author is chair of AACTE’s newly formed “Preparing Teachers for Rural Schools and Communities” topical action group. The views expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of AACTE.
Rural schools and communities may appear as little more than blips on a map, known perhaps for their relaxed pace of life but largely anonymous to the rest of the world. In reality, though, these communities are a critical thread that holds our country together, and preparing educators for the unique needs of rural students and schools is a vital task.
On February 22, AACTE will host the third installment of a four-part webinar series highlighting the experiences and findings of each of the 10 institutions in the AACTE Black and Hispanic/Latino Male Teachers Initiative Networked Improvement Community (NIC). The webinar, “Diversifying the Teacher Pipeline at Boston University, the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, and William Paterson University: Lessons From AACTE’s NIC,” will be held Wednesday, February 22, from 1:00-2:00 p.m. EST.
The webinar will provide an inside look at the path of inquiry guiding the NIC’s overall work and how that process has shaped and changed recruitment and retention of Black, Hispanic, and Latino male teacher candidates at three participating institutions. Presenters will share specific initiatives and strategies developed through their participation in the NIC process to demonstrate how NIC-developed approaches can be adapted locally to advance a common goal – in this case, to increase the percentage of Black and Hispanic/Latino men receiving initial teaching certification through educator preparation programs.
As you plan conferences, retreats, and other meetings of AACTE state chapters, please keep in mind that AACTE staff are available to serve as speakers and presenters on a wide array of topics. Just complete a simple form on our website to request the content you need.
To align with AACTE’s latest initiatives and programs, we recently updated the request form to include the following session topics:
Congratulations to February Holmes Scholar of the Month Desmond Hodge!
Hodge is a 4th-year educational leadership doctoral candidate at Florida A&M University (FAMU). He also serves as clinical services coordinator at the FAMU Center for Disability Access and Resources, where he conducts educational evaluations to identify factors that contribute to students’ learning difficulties.
Hodge’s dedication to scholarship is evident within the Holmes Program and his university. His passion for research permeates all aspects of his professional and educational experiences. He embodies the “growth mindset” that frames his research and serves as a source of support and advocacy for K-12 students as well as for undergraduate students at FAMU.
