the Center for American Progress (the think tank that John Podesta runs) has a new report out describing the failures of teacher prep programs. the report can be found here: http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/07/teacher_accountability.html
the gist of the report is that a new accountability system is needed to ensure that more quality is being injected into teacher prep programs and teacher licensure. the report provides a number of recommendations for individual programs and also states. for example:
- Program accountability—and teacher preparation itself—must focus exclusively on what improves instruction and produces necessary school changes.
- State accountability for teacher preparation should be built on a set of clear signals about program quality that policymakers can understand and program faculty and institutional leaders can use.
- Signals of program quality must be empirically based, measurable indicators and should be derived from a small number of key outcomes.
- Every state’s teacher preparation program accountability system should include a teacher effectiveness measure that reports the extent to which program graduates help their K-12 students to learn.
i suspect that this report is not going away; certainly reform is coming. i think it’s time for those of us in ed tech to promote how technology can play a larger role in improving teacher education and k-12 teaching. if new accountability models are going to be developed then having future teachers held accountable for information literacy skills is necessary, for example. this is our chance to help build classroom observation standards that include integrating educational technology effectively. i encourage everyone in ed tech to be involved in helping to shape our future for the better. this is no time to be passive.
if nothing else, read through the report and start thinking about how you can help shape our future for the better. and then act!