by AFT President Sandra Feldman
June 2000

AFT calls for
higher standards
for new teachers
and teacher education
programs.

When AFT recently released its report on how to improve teacher education, our call for a national test for those entering the teaching profession got a lot of favorable notice. And it should have. Although our proposal that prospective teachers pass a rigorous exam in a subject-matter field as well as pedagogy is no more than other professions expect--and most states already have some form of test--we proposed a high-level national exam because we believe teachers should know and be able to teach their subjects well whether they are in California or Mississippi.

But to some extent this excitement about teacher testing has obscured the rest of our report. That's too bad because what we were offering was nothing less than a blueprint for redesigning the way U.S. teachers are educated and inducted into their profession.

Poles Apart

There are two schools of thought about the best way to educate future teachers. While both sides agree that current teacher education programs don't do a very good job, their proposals for change could not be more different.

According to the people I'll call the "deregulators," we should forget about demanding that prospective teachers meet high academic standards or offering them any kind of teacher-specific education. In fact, the deregulators recommend that we get rid of teacher education programs and most requirements for licensing. Let college graduates who have academic majors and want to be teachers go into the classroom and figure out for themselves how to teach. After all, the deregulators say, teaching, unlike heart surgery, is primarily a matter of trial and error.

The other school of thought, the one represented by our report, calls for raising standards--both for teacher education programs and for prospective teachers. We believe all new teachers should have a strong liberal arts education, an academic major, and on-the-job mentoring with master teachers and that they should pass high-level professional exams--all of which would strengthen the professional component of teaching and bring teaching more in line with other professions like medicine or law. Here are some of our specific recommendations:

• Require two years of core courses in subjects like mathematics, science, and English language arts to ensure that future teachers have a good foundation in the liberal arts.
• Raise the GPA required to enter a teaching program from 2.5 (a C average) to 2.75 and, eventually, 3.0; and replace the low-level exam testing basic literacy that is used by many states with one requiring students to show college-level proficiency in core subject areas before they enter a teaching program.
• Require an academic major so students have a firm grounding in the subject they are preparing to teach.
• Develop a core of pedagogical knowledge that all teachers should have. Today we have a body of knowledge based on new research, and the research evidence has led, for example, to a consensus that has ended the "Reading Wars." College-level courses that reflect this new knowledge will help young teachers make the important decisions about how best to shape their lessons.
• Strengthen what we call the "clinical experience"--that is, the actual training on the job. Much of the practice teaching that prospective teachers get is brief (10 to 12 weeks) and it is often hit or miss. Spending an extended period of time in a well-run program, under the tutelage of a master teacher, would give young teachers an experience similar to the one that physicians get from an internship.
• Require a tough licensing exam that would demand college-level competency in subject matter and pedagogy. This would replace the current state exams that are often set at a basic level.
• Strengthen induction programs. In too many--perhaps most--places, sink-or-swim is still the rule for beginning teachers. A good induction program in which beginners get help from experienced teachers not only strengthens young teachers' skills; it also prevents teacher drop-out.

Teaching is far more complicated than people who have never tried it understand. And it will become more complex as we go forward in the information age. We owe it to our children to be sure their future teachers are able to meet that challenge.

These are ambitious changes, necessary ones, we believe, and they will require a new and unprecedented cooperation between institutions of higher education and public schools. But we already have some pioneer programs, like the ones at the University of Cincinnati and Montclair University in New Jersey, and the work now is to make that excellence universal.