09 Aug2016
By Kristin McCabe
Time is running out to apply for AACTE’s 2017 Outstanding Dissertation Award! Entries must be made online by Tuesday, August 16. Help AACTE showcase outstanding doctoral research at your institution by encouraging your top recent graduates (or recent hires!) to apply for this prestigious award, which includes a $1,000 cash prize.
The Committee on Research and Dissemination will review submissions this fall, and applicants will learn of their status in November (although the announcement of the winner is embargoed until February). The winner then will join other award recipients for special recognition at AACTE’s 69th Annual Meeting in Tampa, Florida, March 2-4, 2017.
26 Jul2016
By Abigail Mercadante and Kristin McCabe
The latest report from the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE) Center for International Education Benchmarking analyzes how four high-performing systems around the world develop elementary teachers with deep content and pedagogical understanding. An accompanying policy brief makes a case for employing these practices in order to strengthen primary education, setting students up for success in high school and beyond.
11 Jul2016
By Kristin McCabe
A new report on international approaches to developing elementary teachers will be released next week at a webcast event featuring AACTE President/CEO Sharon P. Robinson. Register at this link to tune in for the event, which will be held Tuesday, July 19, 10:00 – 11:30 a.m. EDT.
The report, Not So Elementary: Primary School Teacher Quality in Top-Performing Education Systems, is authored by Australian researcher Ben Jensen on behalf of the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE). It looks at international practices in elementary teacher preparation and their effects on student achievement. Recommendations for U.S. policy and practice are included.
20 Jun2016
By Kristin McCabe
Online registration is now open for the 28th annual seminar of the Japan-U.S. Teacher Education Consortium (JUSTEC), to be held November 4-7, 2016, at Japan’s Ehime University. An early-bird discount is in effect through August 15.
This year’s theme is “Collaborative Teacher Education With Local Communities,” with sessions that aim to explore regional rather than national solutions to local needs for educator preparation. The conference schedule includes an optional site visit to two local schools, a city tour, keynotes and seminar presentations from both U.S. and Japanese educators, networking and meal events, and more.
14 Jun2016
By Kristin McCabe
A new study finds that using observational ratings of beginning teachers may be a viable alternative—or a useful complement—to relying solely on controversial “value-added” modeling (VAM) in evaluation of educator preparation providers (EPPs).
An article about the study by Matthew Ronfeldt and Shanyce Campbell of the University of Michigan School of Education, published in the journal Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, is now available online.
In what the authors describe as the first study to investigate the use of teachers’ observational ratings to evaluate their preparation programs and institutions, the results are compelling.
“The demands for teacher preparation accountability continue to grow, from the proposed federal regulations to new accreditation standards,” said Ronfeldt, who was also the 2016 recipient of AACTE’s Outstanding Journal of Teacher Education Article Award. “We sorely need better ways to assess program quality. Although VAM makes an important contribution to our understanding of program outcomes, we likely need multiple measures to capture something as complex as preparation quality. We are excited to find that teacher observational ratings could be a viable supplement.”
09 Jun2016
UPDATE: Submission deadline for Best Practice and Professional Achievement Awards has been extended to October 26
By Kristin McCabe
Nominations for all of the 2017 AACTE awards are now open on AACTE’s online submission site. To read detailed submission information, please refer to the official Call for Entries.
Now in its 21st year, AACTE’s awards program recognizes member institutions’ exemplary programs as well as individuals who have made noteworthy contributions to education preparation. For an overview of last year’s winners, see this press release.
09 May2016
By Kristin McCabe
AACTE is now accepting nominations for the 2017 Outstanding Book Award. Nominations must be made through our online submission system by June 14.
The Outstanding Book Award recognizes books that make a significant contribution to the knowledge base of educator preparation or of teaching and learning with implications for educator preparation. Last year’s winner was Etta Hollins’ Rethinking Field Experiences in Preservice Teacher Preparation: Meeting New Challenges for Accountability (Routledge), and the 2015 winner was Nel Noddings’ Education and Democracy in the 21st Century (Teachers College Press); check our online honor roll for other great recommendations for your summer reading list!
03 May2016
By Kristin McCabe
Time is running out to apply for service on one of AACTE’s standing committees or run for a seat on the Board of Directors! Submit your application (or nominate a colleague) for a 3-year term by Monday, May 9.
Board of Directors
As noted by current Board Chair Jane Bray (Old Dominion University, VA), now is an exciting time to lead AACTE. “Our profession is truly at a tipping point, and the Board of Directors at AACTE is at the forefront of our profession,” she said. The Board’s agenda includes deliberations on the Association’s overall direction, its role in the changing accreditation system, strategic leveraging of resources, and much more. The current roster can be found here.
02 May2016
By Kristin McCabe
For new or prospective deans and department chairs, there’s no better place to get up to speed than AACTE’s Leadership Academy, June 26-30 in Portland, Oregon.
Have you ever puzzled over the relationship between a dean and a department chair? Struggled to organize an effective meeting or to get your message across to higher administration? Wondered how to approach persistent dilemmas or deal with difficult people? These are just some of the topics that past attendees say provided valuable lessons during the Leadership Academy.
“It was very beneficial to listen to others’ experiences and solutions to our similar challenges,” one participant wrote. “These ideas will help me be more efficient and celebrate faculty more.”
02 May2016
By Kristin McCabe
AACTE joins the National Education Association (NEA) and the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA) in celebrating terrific teachers during National Teacher Appreciation Week, May 2-6, and National Teacher Day, May 3.
Tune in to the White House tomorrow as President Obama recognizes this year’s national and state teachers of the year, and don’t forget to reach out to congratulate any honorees who are alumni of your programs!
How can you get involved in the teacher celebration? In addition to holding events for your alumni or simply thanking teachers in person, here are some easy ways to engage on social media:
11 Apr2016
By Kristin McCabe
Are you an expert who can speak on teacher quality issues? Are you interested in discussing education research, policy, and innovation for the knowledge-based economy with colleagues from China and the United States?
The College of Education and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Northern Colorado (UNC) seeks prospective teacher-quality panelists and general participants for an international conference in Beijing this June. There is no registration charge, but space is limited.
29 Mar2016
By Kristin McCabe
The National Policy Board for Education Administration (NPBEA) has officially assumed leadership for the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders (PSEL) 2015, a revision of the former Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC) standards. The standards were formerly owned by the Council of Chief State School Officers, which worked with NPBEA to update the document last year with extensive public input.
"Leaders in higher education and principals at all levels of the K-12 continuum engaged in a thoughtful, deliberative process based on the reality of the contemporary principal’s work," said JoAnn Bartoletti, NPBEA president and executive director of the National Association of Secondary School Principals. "Our consensus is that the new standards are aspirational, reflect the complexity of school leadership, and filter the principal’s work through a lens of student-centered practice. They recognize the importance of cultural responsiveness in the context of a role that addresses the needs of each student."
22 Mar2016
By Kristin McCabe
A new policy brief out of the National Education Policy Center (NEPC) reviews the evidentiary base underlying four national initiatives for teacher preparation program accountability and finds that only one of them—the beginning-teacher performance assessment edTPA—is founded on claims supported by research. The other three mechanisms included in the study are the state and institutional reporting requirements under the Higher Education Act (HEA), the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) standards and system, and the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) Teacher Prep Review.
Holding Teacher Preparation Accountable: A Review of Claims and Evidence, conducted by Marilyn Cochran-Smith and colleagues at Boston College (MA), investigated two primary questions: What claims does each initiative make about how it contributes to the preparation of high-quality teachers? And is there evidence that supports these claims? In addition, researchers looked at the initiatives’ potential to meet their shared goal of reducing educational inequity.
15 Mar2016
By Kristin McCabe
Members of the AACTE Executive Committee held a Town Hall Meeting February 24 at the AACTE 68th Annual Meeting in Las Vegas, providing updates to the membership on key work of the Association and answering questions submitted by the audience on various programmatic and professional issues.
AACTE President/CEO Sharon P. Robinson opened the session with her annual “state of the Association” report. She announced that membership numbers are up to 823 institutional and 32 affiliate members and that several exciting new initiatives are under way—replacing or updating others to be more responsive to member needs. The long-operating Professional Education Data System (PEDS), for example, is now suspended in favor of a new data initiative that will aggregate and report on existing data sets, create benchmarking potential for programs, and more.
09 Mar2016
By Kristin McCabe
The 28th annual seminar of the Japan-U.S. Teacher Education Consortium (JUSTEC) will be held November 4-7, 2016, at Japan’s Ehime University. Conference organizers invite proposals for paper and poster presentations by May 15 under the theme “Collaborative Teacher Education With Local Communities.”
This year’s theme is conceptualized this way:
When we look at trends in formal education, the centralized administrative approach prevails more and more in both the United States and Japan. Such an approach has been pointed out by a number of reports to often produce detachment of teachers’ practices from local conditions and needs. On the other hand, when we look into region-oriented alternative approaches, we can still discover a considerable number of successful cases with alternative methods. JUSTEC 2016 sets a conference theme, “Collaborative Teacher Education with Local Communities,” to explore regionally developed teacher education practices, created with local schools and related parties.