23 Apr2021
By Nicole Dunn
Asian American educator Elizath Kleinrock described her mindset after the reading about the anti-Asian hate crimes in Atlanta last March as, “[un]able to express my sadness, frustration and rage … how could I face my students in class when my body and voice are noticeably shaking?” With anti-Asian hate crimes up 149% in major cities due to increased negative stereotyping amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the educator preparation community must increase its awareness and efforts by teaching true allyship in U.S. schools and communities.
In AACTE’s next Combating Racism in Educator Prep series webinar, a distinguished panel will guide a conversation that addresses the often-omitted civil rights history of the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) here in the United States and resources for teaching that history and why it’s essential in our collective fight to combat systemic racial oppression in our education system. AACTE is ready to seize this present moment to respond to Anti-AAPI racism as an association and hopes you join in these efforts.
Register today to attend the webinar on April 29, 3:30 p.m. EST.
12 Apr2021
By Nicole Dunn
AACTE is honored to welcome another esteemed panel for the third installment of its webinar series, “Combating Racism in Educator Prep.” The third webinar, “Responding to Anti-AAPI Racism in Educator Preparation: Seizing the Present Moment,” centers on the lived experiences of our Asian and Asian American friends, family, colleagues, and students. Valerie Pang, Nicholas D. Hartlep, and Shuhui Fan will discuss the often-omitted history of the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community concerning civil rights and the nation’s P–12 education system. The panel will shed light on the current implications of that context for AAPI educators and students, as well as provide a space to discuss strategies and resources institutions of higher education (IHEs) and individuals can use to ensure policies and culture promote safety and belonging for all AAPI people in our education system.
06 Apr2021
By Nicole Dunn
With the exacerbation of our nation’s teacher shortage brought on by the pandemic, the new White House administration will need to address this crisis strategically, keeping equity top of mind. As AACTE looks forward to improving the capacity and representation in the teacher workforce, it is essential for policy makers to tie decisions back to the historical context of structural oppression that has created barriers for a diverse teacher workforce in the past. As part of the AACTE Network Improvement Community (NIC) Black and Hispanic/Latino Male Teacher Initiative, NIC members identified a number of barriers and solutions to these obstacles, which are highlighted in Reducing Barriers, a segment of AACTE’s new NIC video case studies series.
15 Mar2021
By Nicole Dunn
AACTE is honored to welcome three panelists from member institution Rowan University to lead its next webinar in the Combating Racism in Educator Preparation Series. For this installment, Monika Shealey, Shelley Zion, and Beatrice Carey, who are among those leading the creation and implementation of Rowan’s DEI certificate program, will teach participants to tune into their critical consciousness to sustain a lifelong commitment to addressing structural oppression.
The Critical Consciousness in Educator Preparation webinar will take place on Monday, March 22, 1:00-2:15pm EST. In this interactive webinar, attendees will learn and practice several foundational strategies based on the certificate program modules. Whatever your role and wherever you are on the lifelong path of being a genuinely antiracist, abolitionist, and intersectional educator, you will benefit from this webinar as either a starting or reflective framework for the individual educator to live and promulgate these values through the field.
14 Jan2021
By Nicole Dunn
In this new year, AACTE is recommitting its efforts to support the field in combating the racism that permeates throughout our education system. As a part of these efforts, AACTE will host a webinar each month that is centered on naming, learning, addressing, reforming, and promoting antiracist culture and policies throughout the education system. During these one-hour virtual sessions, you will hear from members and leaders in the field who have been doing the research and work to ensure PK-12 students receive a truly inclusive education. Our goal is for all participants, whether you are an administrator, faculty member, candidate, or current practitioner, to walk away with actionable steps to address internal, interpersonal, and systemic racism.
Racism is a broad and entrenched system of discrimination that has been largely ignored in our history, and every individual in our education system has a part to play in correcting it. Therefore, to begin this series, we want to focus on Discussing Race in Classrooms. In addition to learning how to prepare candidates to discuss racism in PK-12 classrooms, the webinar will address how educator preparation programs and other education field leaders can do the internal, interpersonal, and system-wide work to effectively support and prepare candidates to do so within those programs.
Register Today to join AACTE and the esteemed panel for or its first webinar: Discussing Race in PK-12 Classrooms, Why it’s an Essential Skill, on January 25, 2:00 p.m. EST. We exist in a world of relationships, and therefore, it is imperative that we examine our country’s and our education system’s historic relationship with racism and students of color before we endeavor to implement antiracist policies in our programs. In this session, we will take a look back at the central historic systemic inequities that have created an environment in which a majority of educators are ill-prepared and unwilling to name and discuss race and racism in classrooms. From that historical perspective, we will look at its effects on discipline and special education systems, both of which maintain systemic inequities and exacerbate racial discrimination for students with intersectional identities.
Register for Discussing Race in PK-12 Classrooms, Why It’s an Essential Skill
08 Dec2020
By Nicole Dunn
A growing body of research suggests that concerns about compensation generally—and about being able to repay student loans in particular—are dissuading college students from choosing teaching as a career. To help AACTE members better understand the financial pressures impacting education students, a new issue brief takes a detailed look at how students pursuing a bachelor’s degree in education pay for college, including the costs they face and the financial sources they tap to meet those expenses.
During AACTE’s webinar “How Do Students Pay for College,” author Jacqueline King and Jane West discussed the implications of these findings, as well as recommendations for campus practice and federal policy.
King began the webinar by explaining, “Student financing of education feels archaic and arcane … can be kind of intimidating.” To help those who were unable to join this webinar, outlined below are specific parts of the online discussion that may address some of your most pressing concerns around financing teacher candidate education. Access the recording at aacte.org.
08 Dec2020
By Nicole Dunn
AACTE and CEEDAR (Collaboration for Effective Educator Development, Accountability, and Reform) Center are partnering together to present a webinar centered on a special issue brief, Leading and Engaging Faculty in Teacher Preparation Reform: The Role of Deans. The issue brief summarizes the experiences in leadership of six current and former deans who have been identified as engaging in successful collaborative reform efforts within their colleges.
During the one-hour event, Mary Brownwell will talk with Marquita Grenot-Scheyer and Kandi Hill-Clarke about the issue brief and their experiences of cultivating collaboration and supporting innovation among general and special education faculty who share responsibility to support students in diverse and inclusive classrooms. Since few resources exist to support deans in their efforts to work with faculty to engage in this work, AACTE and CEEDAR believe the experiences of these leaders will be useful to other deans as they work toward similar outcomes.
Register for the webinar, which will take place December 16 from 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. (ET). Learn more about the panelists:
23 Oct2020
By Nicole Dunn
Principals are leading schools through significant challenges and uncertainties and, in the process, some aspects of teaching, learning, and leadership may be indelibly changed. The Evolution of the Principalship learning series is an invitation to join with national experts in considering how principals’ work has changed and how our understanding of school leadership has evolved. Throughout this learning series, which is supported by the Wallace Foundation and organized by the American Institutes for Research (AIR) and the University Council of Education Administration (UCEA), we will talk with principals, researchers, and other experts about the following:
- What have the disruptions in schooling taught us, as principals and education leaders?
- How have principals’ priorities and daily work changed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic? Which changes are temporary, and which are indelible?
- How can leadership and learning capitalize on community social and cultural histories to deepen engagement, achievement and equity?
- What do the changes to school leadership mean for principal pipeline supports, including principal preparation and professional learning?
As you participate in these free online sessions, you can expect national experts to share their research and tools, and to engage you in dialogue about the evolution of school leadership.
20 Oct2020
By Nicole Dunn
AACTE invites you to participate in a webinar hosted by the Wallace Foundation and RAND to discuss insights from The Partnerships for Social Emotional Learning Initiative (PSELI).
PSELI is a comprehensive, multiyear initiative funded by The Wallace Foundation to explore whether and how students can benefit from intentional partnerships between schools and afterschool/out-of-school time programs focused on building social-emotional skills—and what it takes to do this work.
This free webinar, will share important insights from a new RAND report, Early Lessons From Schools and Out-of-School Time Programs Implementing Social and Emotional Learning, that examines 38 sites in six communities during the first two years of the PSELI initiative. AACTE encourages members not to miss this event at a time when interest in SEL is outstripping empirical guidance about how to implement these programs and practices.
Researchers from RAND will focus on topics such as developing adults’ capacity to promote SEL, improving climate and delivering SEL instruction to students, executing system-level activities to launch and coordinate SEL work across multiple sites, and developing partnerships between schools and afterschool/out-of-school time programs.
02 Oct2020
By Nicole Dunn
AACTE invites you to join the fifth and final session of The Wallace Foundation’s University Principal Preparation Initiative (UPPI) learning series. This session, Moving Carefully into the Next Normal: Enduring Leadership Dilemmas and New Organizational Contexts, will explore the question, “how can the teaching and learning faculty and education leadership faculty work together to prepare the next generation of school leaders?” Deans, department chairs, faculty, and district staff will receive a protocol designed to explore the assets of each department and how they can be combined to better prepare leaders.
27 Aug2020
By Nicole Dunn
Having a Holmes Program at your institution is an excellent way to provide professional development and student support for racially diverse candidates in educator preparation programs (EPPs). With the upcoming financial challenges COVID-19 will bring to funding efforts that will lead to diversification in the field, AACTE is committed to helping provide those development opportunities with a new resource—the Holmes Program Coordinators Directory.
Are you interested in expanding or creating a Holmes Program? AACTE Holmes Program Coordinators have the experiential knowledge to share with those looking to learn more about the benefits and logistics to starting a Holmes Program at the Masters or Doctoral level. You can learn more by accessing the new Holmes Program Coordinators Directory in the AACTE Resource Library.
27 Aug2020
By Nicole Dunn
As school contexts are increasingly complex, school leaders must design programming to address the needs of their diverse students. AACTE invites members to participate in the fourth session of The Wallace Foundation’s University Principal Preparation Initiative (UPPI) learning series, which is framed around the primary question: How do we prepare school leaders to lead schools towards equitable outcomes for all learners?
Register now for Equipping and Sustaining Equity-Oriented School Leaders for Diverse Contexts: Tools and Takeaways.
- Date: September 10, 2020
- Facilitator: April L. Peters, associate professor and associate department chair at the University of Houston.
- Presentation: 1:00–1:45 p.m. EST
- UPPI member-only discussion: 1:45–2:30 p.m. EST (A separate email will be sent with a registration link for this session to all UPPI member registrants.)
19 Aug2020
By Nicole Dunn
Join the final session of the AACTE Back to School Webinar Series on August 26 where presenters will discuss how educator preparation programs will use the lessons learned this past spring during the COVID-19 pandemic and apply them to the upcoming academic year. This session is already at 80% capacity, so register soon!
AACTE and EdPrepLab – Preparing educators during COVID-19: Lessons learned and new challenges for Fall 2020
August 26, 2020, 3:00 – 4:00pm
AACTE and Educator Preparation Laboratory (EdPrepLab), an initiative of the Learning Policy Institute (LPI) and Bank Street Graduate School of Education, are excited to share lessons learned during COVID on effective teacher and leader preparation strategies this past spring. Panelists discuss how educator preparation has been shaped by the experiences of the spring and the demands of the new school year. The discussion also will address how programs are continually reimagining their structures and practices even as they maintain a focus on key commitments to deeper learning and equity. Questions addressed will include: (1) How are programs applying what they learned during the spring school shutdowns to adapt to emerging conditions in the fall? (2) How are programs continuing to adapt to new challenges including remote and hybrid school start-ups, social distancing requirements, and students’ social-emotional needs? (3) How are programs positioning themselves and their teacher and leader candidates, as assets for Pk-12 schools in providing equitable deeper learning opportunities for all students?
Register Now.
14 Aug2020
By Nicole Dunn
Register today for the final two webinars in AACTE’s Back to School Webinars Series this month. On August 18, join AACTE and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) to review and discuss survey data and case studies that cover higher education’s ability to help PK-12 schools integrate technology. Then, on August 26, rejoin EdPrepLab to learn how educator preparation has been shaped by the experiences of the spring and the demands of the new school year. Read on for more webinar details.
ISTE: Integrating Digital Technologies in Remote K-12 Learning: Lessons for Higher Education Preparation Programs
August 18, 2020 12:30 – 2:00 p.m. ET
As a result of the global health pandemic, teacher preparedness to integrate digital technology into their teaching has become a leading topic of conversation in both the PK-12 and higher education communities. How well are PK-12 teachers being prepared to integrate digital technologies and the ISTE Standards into their PK-12 teaching? What is higher education doing well? Where are the gaps?
In this webinar, you will hear from AACTE Innovation and Technology Committee co-chair Liz Kolb and Victoria Carter from the University of Michigan about two survey results pre and post COVID-19. The first survey, pre COVID-19, investigates PK-12 teachers’ and administrators’ perceptions of how well new teachers are prepared to integrate technology tools and the ISTE Standards for Students. The second survey focuses on how teachers experience remote teaching and learning during the pandemic. While both are national surveys, we will focus on the state of Michigan as a case study. The presentation will include suggestions and implications for teacher preparation in higher education as well as PK-12 district professional development for moving toward high-quality preparation of teacher candidates for face to face, remote, and blended learning environments with technology tools.
Register now
07 Aug2020
By Nicole Dunn
Join AACTE on August 12 and 13 from 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. for its first back to school webinar series. Over the course of these two sessions, panelists with experience in using the Accomplished Teaching, Learning and Schools (ATLAS) library with the FAVSTE framework will introduce participants to these tools and how to use these tools to effectively utilize video tasks in teacher preparation. These ideas are applicable across different levels of certification (elementary, middle, and secondary) and school contexts.
Panelists will include the following:
- Brett Criswell – West Chester University
- Heather Jo Johnson – Vanderbilt
- Jessica Anna Arias – Kennesaw State University
- Lawrence T Escalada – University of Northern Iowa
- Shelly Forsythe – Texas State University
Register today to attend the two-part webinar: ATLAS and FAVSTE: A Tool and a Framework for Using Video in Teacher Preparation.
