Categories
Teacher Education

Week of May 26 in Teacher Ed News

GLOBAL
National Center for Education and the Economy. Preparing Teachers To Use Technology   While strategies vary, each of these jurisdictions trusts teachers to serve as experts and lead their peers in the rapidly evolving space of online teaching and learning… While strategies vary, each of these jurisdictions trusts teachers to serve as experts and lead their peers in the rapidly evolving space of online teaching and learning. 

Government of Newfoundland and Labrador. Minister Warr Recognizes Early Childhood Educators Week   Today, the Honourable Brian Warr, Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development virtually joined the Association of Early Childhood Educators to proclaim Early Childhood Educators Week, May 24-30…. There are approximately 2,200 certified early childhood educators in communities throughout the province working in child care centres, family child care homes, family resource centres, educational institutions, businesses, and not-for-profit organizations.

Standard Media. Teachers Back Calls to Suspend, Reset Exams. “Kenya National Examination Council (Knec) should reset national exams since the syllabus will not be covered adequately and promptly,” reads a joint report by the Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut), Universities Academic Staff Union (Uasu) and Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC)… The findings came after the team unsuccessfully lobbied to be included in the government’s Education Response Committee led by Dr Sara Ruto that seeks to advise on the reopening of all basic learning institutions, teacher training colleges and adult education institutions.

 

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) 2020 Annual Meeting Opening Session: Robin DiAngelo, Keynote Speaker
2) Teaching Online: Moving from Emergency to Planned
3) Updates to AACTE’s COVID-19 Educator Preparation Policy Tracker Map   These changes include guidance analysis of 12 new states, specifically Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Maryland, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Wyoming. We have also updated data for New Jersey, which recently issued new guidance waiving edTPA.

Baltimore Sun. Desks 6 feet apart? Elementary only? Temperatures taken at the door? Maryland schools plan for coronavirus contingencies   “It is not about cramming them back into the same old school so we can do six months of teaching in one month,” said Tom Hatch, a professor at Teachers College….Some teachers with pre-existing conditions or older teachers may not feel comfortable coming back into school buildings, and there’s already a teacher shortage in Maryland, where teacher colleges do not produce enough graduates each year to fill vacancies.

Chalkbeat. How the National Teacher of the Year connects preschoolers and senior citizens, even during the pandemic   How did you decide that you wanted to be a teacher? I always knew that I wanted to help people, but when I was a senior or a junior in high school, I was taking a dual-credit college Spanish course, and part of that was volunteering to teach Spanish to preschoolers. For the first time, I got to observe a teacher. I got to see teaching as an art form in that classroom. And I knew then that it was something that I wanted to be a part of.

EdSurge. Pandemic May (Finally) Push Online Education Into Teacher Prep Programs   Even teacher prep programs that are offered via online courses don’t necessarily instruct teacher candidates how to educate students remotely, says Lynn Gangone, president and CEO of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education.

Education Writers Association. Teacher Prep, Interrupted: Licensing Educators During Coronavirus: Experts discuss emergency waivers and their potential impact [May 15 Webinar now available]

Hechinger Report.
1) Are we ready? How we are teaching – and not teaching – kids about climate change at all.   Mead teaches at a private school where he is given the freedom to explore climate change in depth. However, he mentors teachers around the state who say they’re fearful of broaching the issue. Some teachers tell him they don’t even feel well versed enough in climate science to pass on any expertise to students.
2) Schools call parents “co-teachers,” but we have no idea what we’re doing: Learning only happens with a high-quality teacher, but parents have been dropped into the role with no training and little support   Because even the most engaging, thoughtful remote learning programs will not be enough to close the educational divides that are opening wider by the day unless we can provide a serious amount of support and training not just for teachers, but also for parents — holding our hands as we hold our children’s hands through this stressful time.
3) The educational value of a black teacher: Coronavirus is offering a chance to ‘reimagine’ education, but if the new landscape doesn’t include efforts to recruit and retain more black teachers, reform will be a farce   For years, researchers such as Gloria Ladson-Billings, Pedro Noguera, Lisa Delpit, Adrienne Dixson, Christopher Emdin, and James A. Banks — all people of color — validated the need for black teachers in New Orleans schools through their studies on teachers of color… If the purpose of education reform is to boost students’ academic outcomes, reduce suspensions, raise expectations, and even recruit (less racist) teachers into the profession, research suggests that increasing the number of black teachers should be part of any serious strategy.

InsideHigherEd. Can Active Learning Co-Exist With Physically Distanced Classrooms?   Ellen Maddin, co-director of the Center for Teaching and Learning and associate professor of teacher education at Northern Kentucky University, also suggested ways instructors could tap students’ own laptops, tablets or phones to stimulate active learning. “I use Padlet for many purposes — to capture ideas in small group work, as a backchannel if we watch a video clip, to brainstorm challenges and potential solutions, to analyze case studies, etc.” Padlet works well in a face-to-face setting, Maddin said, especially when the instructor pulls the whole group back together to discuss individual/group responses — shared on the large screen.

NEA. Remote Teaching and Learning Courses   Enroll in one of NEA’s virtual remote blended learning courses to learn the basic components of remote learning and successful instruction outside of the traditional classroom. [courses begin June 15]

NYTimes.
1) Remember the MOOCs? After Near-Death, They’re Booming   The pioneering online learning networks offer hard-earned lessons for what works and what doesn’t with online education.
2) The Future of College Is Online, and It’s Cheaper: The coronavirus forced a shift to virtual classes, but their continuation could be beneficial even after the pandemic ends.   Professors would need to undergo training on how to effectively teach to a blended classroom. Universities would also be well served to build competencies in content production. Today, almost all theory-based content, whether in chemistry, computer science or finance, can be produced in advance and effectively delivered asynchronously. By tapping their best-rated professors to be the stars of those productions, universities could actually raise the pedagogical standard.

U.S. Education Dept. FY 2020 Call For Peer Reviewers: Effective Educator Development Division … seeking peer reviewers for the upcoming grant competitions. Those grant programs are Supporting Effective Educator Development (SEED), Teacher and School Leader Incentive Program (TSL) & Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP). 

Washington Post.
1) ‘The future of public education is at stake’: An open letter to Joe Biden from 215 school advocates
* Guarantee tuition-free public colleges, universities, HBCUs, Minority Serving Institutions and trade-schools to all, not just those who qualify through means-testing.
* Cancel all student loan debt and place a cap on student loan interest rates moving forward.
2) How to recover from our school disaster: Top curriculums, training and resolve   Petrilli recommended against dumping the Common Core standards, since the likely alternatives would be old state standards “that were mediocre, unclear and targeted at basic literacy and numeracy.” The writers said that if states banned weak curriculums and overhauled teacher preparation, progress could be made. 

 

NEW YORK STATE
Gotham Gazette. New Yorkers Can Weigh In On Recommendations for New Student ‘Civic Readiness’ Standards   In a recent email, the chair of the task force, Michael Rebell of The Center for Educational Equity at Columbia University’s Teachers College, wrote that “Despite the budgetary uncertainty stemming from the ongoing coronavirus crisis, Governor Cuomo and the New York State legislature approved a $1 million appropriation for ‘education in civics, diversity and religious freedoms.’ As a result of this appropriation, the New York State Education Department (NYSED) is now seeking feedback on the policy recommendations developed by the Regents’ Civic Readiness Task Force.

LOHUD/USA Today. Regents to name task force on reopening schools, Rosa says    Rosa said the Regents have been working on its reopening project for about a month and have a “massive” plan to include teachers, administrators, parents and other stakeholders.

NYSATE/NYACTE. Award Nominations   Though the in-person Fall 2020 NYSATE/NYACTE Conference is cancelled, we still want to encourage you to consider nominating a colleague for NYSATE’s Appleby or NYACTE’s Mackey Award. 

NYSED.  New York Register Public Comment Period regarding the Proposed Amendments to Sections 52.21, 60.6, 61.19, 80- 1.2, 80-3.7, 100.1, 100.2, 100.4, 100.5, 100.6, 100.7, 100.19 and 151-1.3 and addition of Section 80-5.27 to the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education Relating to Addressing the COVID-19 Crisis.  Data, views or arguments may be submitted to: Julia Patane, NYS Education Department, 89 Washington Avenue, Room 148EB, Albany, NY 12234, (518) 474-6400, email: [email protected] Public comment will be received until: 60 days after publication of this notice.

 

NEW YORK CITY
Chalkbeat. Carranza’s No. 2 at the education department is job hunting outside NYC   Cheryl Watson-Harris was briefly one of more than 20 candidates vying to become superintendent of Sarasota County schools…Aaron Pallas, department chair of education policy and analysis at Teachers College at Columbia University, said it’s likely that Watson-Harris is simply looking to take on her own leadership role.

Categories
Teacher Education

Week of May 18 in Teacher Ed News

GLOBAL
Education International. Guiding principles on the COVID-19 pandemic   Governments must also develop strategies to address the consequences of closing teacher training and other higher education institutions, bearing in mind the already existing high teacher shortages. 

Global Partnership for Education. Global Partnership for Education provides $68 million in grants for education response to COVID-19 (coronavirus)   The grant will also train teachers to provide psychosocial support to students, parents and communities. The World Bank is the grant agent in Ghana.

Norwegian Agency for Quality Assurance in Education (NOKUT).  Transforming Norwegian Teacher Education: The Final Report of the International Advisory Panel for Primary and Lower Secondary Teacher Education

UNESCO. Breaking educational language barriers in Mozambique   In 2019, CapED piloted the first year of the curriculum in five districts across four provinces (Gaza, Maputo, Nampula, and Sofala) and is currently training teacher-educators, teachers and adult educators to use the 2nd year of the curriculum.

 

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) Education Funding and Next COVID-19 Relief Bill: The HEROES Act   Educators across the board praised the bill and lauded its continued investment in education.  These numbers are likely the high-water mark for education spending in the next COVID-19 relief package; however, they do fall short of requests made by K-12 educators who were looking for $250 billion. 
2) How the Center for Urban Education in Denver is Reimagining Teacher Preparation Programs   Outreach efforts are paying off: last year, CUE enrolled 130 students, more than 70 % of whom identify as students of color and over 90 % of whom are first-generation college students. What’s more, 70 % of candidates were transfer students from local community colleges, according to data provided by CUE.

American University Summer Institute on Education, Equity, and Justice. Uplifting Women & Girls of Color Through Antiracist Pedagogy, Practice & Policy [Virtual Conference June 22-24]

Cal Matters. We must invest in teachers now as students transition to distance learning    Every dollar put into teacher training today will yield multiples in a post-COVID-19 world… More than 300 teachers in our district use a reading and writing curriculum called Units of Study, developed by Columbia University’s Teachers College Reading and Writing Project…When COVID-19 hit, I turned to Teachers College to armor myself with tactics to support our teachers as they made the difficult transition to distance learning. I’ve attended daily Zoom calls with their professional development experts, as well as a three-day virtual institute on literacy. 

CCSSO. Tabatha Rosproy, Kansas 2020 National Teacher of The Year  … a 10-year veteran Kansas teacher, is the first early childhood educator to be named National Teacher of the Year…  holds a Bachelor of Arts in unified early childhood education, including special education and typically developing students, from Southwestern College and is near completion of her Master of Science in education (English as a Secondary or Other Language) at Fort Hays State University. 

Chalkbeat. Facing an uncertain summer, Teach for America and other prep programs will train teachers online   TFA is one of many non-traditional teacher preparation programs that rely on the summer months to give new teachers experience in front of students. Some programs are working to figure out how to capture some of that with virtual summer school, while others say they’ll focus on skills like lesson planning in the short term and double down on coaching in the fall.

Education Week. Kenneth S. Goodman, ‘Founding Father’ of Whole Language, Dead at 92   “His greater legacy is undeniable. I bet you that in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s there’s hardly a teacher who went through a teacher education program anywhere in the country who didn’t encounter Goodman’s work,” said P. David Pearson, a professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. One reason whole language became so popular among teachers was because it emphasized teachers’ knowledge and skill in responding to student needs, rather than scripted programs and curricula…

Forbes. A New “New Deal” For Education: Top 10 Policy Moves For States In The COVID 2.0 Era   States should make sure that providing these kinds of supports for students, families, and educators—as well as curriculum and professional development supports for educators to infuse these skills into all school experiences—is a priority throughout this pandemic and beyond.

Inside Higher Ed. Arkansas-Little Rock Lays Off 13 Professors   Affected are two associate professors and one instructor of theater arts and dance; an associate professor of world languages; seven professors of education; and one associate professor and professor of systems engineering. 

Texas A&M University Corpus Christi. Island University Welcomes Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education this Fall   Starting this fall, Islanders who plan to teach at an elementary school can enroll in the Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education…

Washington Post. Expanding AmeriCorps could turn new grads into an army of contact tracers. It just needs funding.   Some of the most well-known programs under the AmeriCorps umbrella, such as Teach for America, have played important and controversial roles in the public sector. Critics have derided such national service programs as domestic “voluntourism,” a way station for well-off grads en route to law school.

 

NEW YORK STATE
NYSED.
1) Distance Education Flexibility Fall 2020 Semester   Professional licensure and educator preparation program clinical experience courses must meet regulatory requirements, and students must complete adequate clinical hours to ensure competency. Updated clinical experience guidance and considerations may be forthcoming based upon the circumstances of the continuing emergency.
2) Emergency COVID-19 Certificate. The Emergency COVID-19 certificate type is now available in TEACH for applicable certificate titles. There were technical issues with the application on May 22 in the morning that have been fixed.
3) The NYS Board of Regents invites applications & nominations for Commissioner of Education & President of the University of the State of New York. [Applications & nominations should be received by June 8, 2020.]

 

NEW YORK CITY
Bank Street College. Making Teacher Preparation Policy Work: Lessons From And For New York

Chalkbeat. In response to coronavirus, this Harvard sophomore created a free tutoring service for low-income NYC students   Aaron Pallas, a professor at Teachers College, said organizations like EduMate could help students navigate a particularly disruptive moment emotionally by connecting them with young adult tutors who may identify with them… The program’s limited training and time spent with students, at just an hour a week, would likely mean that its effects are modest, Pallas suggested. But at zero cost, he added, there isn’t much of a harm in trying.

New York Daily News. The reinvention schools really need: Four New York teachers of the year push back at Gov. Cuomo   But you don’t become a teacher, let alone state Teacher of the Year as each of us has, without dealing with the hard challenges that come with being an educator.

New York Times. Richard Gilder, Donor to Parks, Museum and History, Dies at 87   They incorporated the collection into the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, which they established in 1994 to promote research, teacher training, exhibitions and classroom curriculums… Mr. Gilder’s philanthropy extended across West 77th Street to the American Museum of Natural History, to which he gave $50 million to establish the Richard Gilder Graduate School. 

Teachers College.
1) 2020 Convocation. “During times like these, our responsibility to ourselves & those around us is only magnified…Let us empower our communities…May we always use our positions as Teachers College, Columbia University grads to uplift & empower.” —Amann Syed Ahmad (MA Early Childhood Education ’20)
2) Mentors, Scholars, Editors and Authors: More honors for TC faculty, students and emeriti   Professor Emerita Frances Schoonmaker has received the Agatha Award for Best Middle Grade/Young Adult Mystery for her 2019 novel, The Last Crystal… Schoonmaker (Ed.D.’83) directed the College’s graduate elementary and middle school teacher education program — which drew heavily on children’s literature and storytelling — for nearly twenty years.
3) Teaching from Empathy: Dylan Kapit understands disability and difference from the inside   Following graduation, Kapit will head to the University of Pittsburgh to pursue a Ph.D. in Special Education, with a focus on teacher training and the development of a sexual education curriculum for people with autism.

Categories
Teacher Education

Week of May 11 in Teacher Ed News

GLOBAL
Global Partnership for Education. Releasing the potential of teachers in the COVID response in low-income countries   Teacher training is also needed to help teachers work with the new modalities required during the crisis… Uganda’s teacher training institutes are offering capacity building workshops to strengthen teachers’ ICT skills to use distance learning platforms during the pandemic. 

International Task Force on Teachers for Education 2030. Knowledge Hub  The portal will facilitate information sharing on teachers and teaching issues among members and non-members of the TTF.

UNESCO. Webinars on COVID-19 education response

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) AACTE and Mursion Present Virtual Reality Classrooms   This partnership, offered at a special rate for AACTE members, offers educators and students world-class experiential learning through simulations for long-term success. 
2) State Policy Tracking Map: State Actions to Support EPPs and Teacher Candidates
3) Due Dates Extended for Annual Meeting Reviewer and Proposal Submissions

Chalkbeat.
1) Solving Illinois’ teacher shortage is complicated. These five charts explain why  Research has shown that it matters where programs are located. Whalen noted that a majority of teacher candidates choose to teach near where they went to school or where they are from originally. In Illinois, nearly one in five districts is more than 30 miles from a teacher training program, hampering their ability to recruit student teachers and build pipelines to future educators.
2) Teaching reading was hard before a pandemic. Now Chicago teachers walk a tightrope of technology and attention   Chicago adopted a common but controversial approach known as balanced literacy. It uses individual and group reading, context clues, some phonics, and writing practice. Critics say that method, often used in teacher training programs throughout Illinois, is not supported by science on how children learn basic literacy skills.

Connecticut State Board of Education. Temporary Flexibilities – Educator Preparation Programs
–  The expectation remains that spring 2020 ‘Student Teacher’ candidates submit a completed edTPA portfolio where possible. However, the CSDE will waive the cut score for all candidates.
–  EPPs will be able to submit an edTPA Waiver Request for any ‘Student Teacher’ candidate who is unable to submit a completed edTPA portfolio as a result of COVID-19 related circumstances.

Education Week. [NOTE: Full, Premium Access to TC community]
1) Educators, This Is Our Moment to Defend the Teaching Profession [OpEd by TC Prof. Amy Stuart Wells]  As celebrities Tweet that teachers should be paid as much as CEOs, educators must tap into this newfound appreciation to demand policies that ensure educators are well-trained, well-supported, and well-paid for the work they do. Quick-fix, teacher-prep-lite programs—especially for those assigned to teach in the most disadvantaged schools—are not acceptable.
2) How to Teach Math to Students With Disabilities, English-Language Learners   Cathery Yeh, an assistant professor of teacher education at Chapman University in Orange, Calif… said, “Math teachers—we often see ourselves as content-area teachers. Like our job is to be knowledgeable about math and not necessarily responsible for promoting language development,” Yeh said. “But we have to support learning math through language and learning language through math.”

Learning Policy Institute. Webinar: A Deeper Dive into How Educator Preparation Programs are Adapting During COVID-19 [3pm May 21]

Mursion/American Institutes for Research. Findings from a Randomized Field Study of a Teacher Professional Development Program using Classroom Simulation to Develop Mathematics Instruction. [May 14 webinar recording]

NEAToday. Five Educators Share Advice for New Teachers  It’s still too early to tell what the next school year will look like post pandemic, but that doesn’t mean educators are in a holding pattern, especially those who will be newly minted teachers in the next year or so.

New Jersey Board of Education. Waiver of Performance Assessment Certification Requirements During COVID-19 Public Health Emergency  The following guidance provides a description of the New Jersey Department of Education’s (NJDOE) waiver of the teacher certification performance assessment (edTPA) requirement as necessitated by the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency and related limitations.  The NJDOE aims to ensure all candidates who are otherwise eligible for certification but cannot complete the edTPA due to temporary assessment disruptions caused by the pandemic can earn initial or permanent (standard) educator certification.

Washington Post. Michigan settles historic lawsuit after court rules students have a constitutional right to a ‘basic’ education, including literacy   The suit argued that students blamed “substandard performance on poor conditions within their classrooms, including missing or unqualified teachers, physically dangerous facilities, and inadequate books and materials.” Conditions in the schools, the students said, had deprived them “of a basic minimum education” that allows a chance at foundational literacy.

NEW YORK STATE
NYSED. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) NYS Colleges and Universities Impacted by the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency
-Update on Certification Examination Guidance
-Moving to Pass/Fail Grades for Content and Pedagogy Courses
-Liberal Arts and Sciences (LAS) Core
-Programs that Lead to Both Certification and Professional Licensure
-Summer 2020 EPP Clinical Experiences
-GRE Requirement for Admission to Graduate Teacher and Educational Leadership Programs

NEW YORK CITY
New York Post. NYC DOE slashes fellowship program cutting hundreds of teaching jobs   A total of 475 accepted NYC Teaching Fellows applicants were slated to begin training this summer for eventual placement in the fall.

Categories
Teacher Education

Week of May 4 in Teacher Ed News

GLOBAL
Association for Teacher Education in Europe. ATEE Webinar 15 May, 4 PM CET – Online Teacher Education, Good Practices And Challenges [register by 13 May]

International Task Force on Teachers for Education 2030. April Newsletter

Journal of Education for Teaching. CFP Special Issue Teacher Education in the Covid-19 Pandemic: a Global Snapshot [intention to submit by 15, May 2020]

UNESCO. How a young teacher is making gender equality a reality in Ethiopia   Tigist participated in a training about gender-responsive pedagogy (GRP) as part of a UNESCO project in Ethiopia. The training built teachers’ capacity to establish teaching and learning processes that encourage equal participation and involvement of boys and girls, and take into account boys’ and girls’ specific interests, learning styles and needs.

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) Beware the Solution That Is Not About the Problem: Reflections on Education and the COVID-19 Shock   Kline offers the post-Katrina charterization of New Orleans schools as a case in point… All of the teachers were fired. A teacher workforce that had been predominately black was replaced with one that was predominately white, young, and barely trained. 
2) Revolutionizing Education AACTE DEI Video: Promoting Equal Access to Quality Teachers   In celebration of National Teacher Appreciation Week, May 4-8, AACTE spotlights “Promoting Equal Access to Quality Teachers,” as the next segment in its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion video series

Education News. Correcting Carter’s Mistake: Removing Cabinet Status from the U.S. Department of Education   At the turn of the century, the nation’s largest teachers’ union began advocating for a federal agency in order to train teachers and improve literacy rates.

Education Week. Map: Coronavirus and School Closures

Hechinger Report. The overlooked power of Zuckerberg-backed learning program lies offline   Summit’s summer training is full of evangelists for the platform — teachers, like Villegas, who have become “fellows” to help train their colleagues around the country on the model, and administrators who are back for the second or third year with new teachers. They share impressive results.

Mursion. May 5th webinar Recording: Let’s test drive classroom simulations: Introducing Content for Upper Elementary

NJ.com. Fewer people are studying to become teachers in N.J. Could higher pay, appreciation reverse the trend?   Researchers attribute those losses to an onslaught of issues. They include low pay in comparison to other college graduates, benefits changes, high costs to become a teacher and several statewide policy changes that both added barriers to receiving a certification and made the job more difficult.

U.S. News. Missouri Teachers Virtually Educate Students About Pandemic   Pat Friedrichsen, a professor of science education at MU, was awarded a $200,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to help create a coronavirus curriculum aimed at informing Missouri high schoolers the science of the pandemic and its effects on everyday life.

Washington Post.
1) Navient reaches settlement in teachers’ loan forgiveness lawsuit   Ten educators, backed by the American Federation of Teachers union, accused Navient of misleading them about Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The program encourages people to work in the public sector with the promise of canceling the balance of their federal student debt after a decade of payments.
2) The profound civics lesson kids are getting from the U.S. government’s response to the covid-19 pandemic   The coronavirus pandemic lays bare two major weaknesses in traditional approaches to teaching civics and history — what students are expected to learn and how we measure that learning. 

NEW YORK STATE
Chalkbeat. Cuomo taps Gates Foundation to ‘reimagine’ what schooling looks like in NY   While praising educators for their work over the past seven weeks, he also said schools are still working to get computers and tablets to students, and that some teachers lacked the right training in the technology they would use to teach students at home.

NYS Board of Regents invites applications & nominations for Commissioner of Education & President of the University of the State of New York. The search is being assisted by ABG Search. Applications & nominations should be received by June 8, 2020.

New York State Education Department Office of Teaching Initiatives.
1) Emergency COVID-19 Certificate   Candidates who are seeking certain certificates and extensions that require exam(s) may be eligible for the Emergency COVID-19 certificate, allowing them to work in New York State public schools or districts for one year while taking and passing the required exam(s) for the certificate or extension sought.
2) Extension of Certain Certificates Expiring on August 31, 2020   …educators who hold an Initial certificate, Initial Reissuance, Provisional certificate, or Provisional Renewal with an expiration date of August 31, 2020 will have the expiration date extended to January 31, 2021 in order to provide them with the time needed to complete the requirements for the next level certificate.
3) edTPA Safety Net for Candidates Who Are Enrolled in a New York State Registered Educator Preparation Program During the COVID-19 Crisis in the Spring 2020 and/or Summer 2020 Terms   …take the ATS-W appropriate for the certificate title sought (Elementary or Secondary). Candidates seeking an “All Grades” certificate could take either the Elementary or Secondary ATS-W.
4) Acceptance of “Pass” Grades, or its Equivalent, in the Individual Evaluation Pathway to Certification During the Spring, Summer, or Fall 2020 Terms  …the Department will allow any undergraduate or graduate level content core or pedagogical core course, completed during the Spring, Summer, or Fall 2020 terms with a “pass” grade, or its equivalent, to count towards the content core or pedagogical core semester hour requirements for certification through the Individual Evaluation pathway.

New York State Education Department Office Of Higher EducationEducator Preparation April Newsletter
Guidance For Educator Preparation Programs In Response To Covid-19
Board Of Regents Items
Graduation Measures Regional Meetings

NEW YORK CITY
Teaching Residents at Teachers College.
1) MAY 2020 Spring Edition Newsletter
2) Updated Production Report, 2012-2020  19 peer-reviewed publications, 57 global conference presentations and counting!

 

Categories
Teacher Education

Week of April 27 in Teacher Ed News

GLOBAL
Education International. Cameroon: teachers must get more support in developing their skills to help them deliver quality distance education  Concerning the use of information and communication technologies in Cameroon to prepare teachers to give online classes, it is “marginal” according to Roger Kaffo, General Secretary of the Syndicat National Autonome de l’Enseignement Secondaire (SNAES) …

Google/UNESCO. Teach From Home.  A temporary hub of information and tools to help teachers during the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis.

Thomas Reuters Foundation News. Don’t let girls’ education be another casualty of the coronavirus   Educators should be trained about the threat of violence against girls and child marriage and refer at-risk girls to protective services.

UNESCO. Startling digital divides in distance learning emerge   Teachers also require training to deliver distance and online education effectively, but such support is particularly scarce in low-income countries. Across sub-Saharan Africa, just 64% of primary and 50% of secondary teachers have received minimum training, and this frequently does not include ICT skills.

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) Call for Peer Reviewers: 2021 Annual Meeting Proposals
2) Helping Teacher Educators Take a Stand Against Hate   …Deeper Dive presentation, “Combating Discrimination and Hatred Through Education,” at AACTE’s 72nd Annual Meeting in Atlanta

CBS Austin. Pandemic relaxes student teacher certification requirements in Texas. Shortly after many local governments issued some sort of ‘stay home, work safe’ order, the state issued a waiver changing student teacher certification requirements, in part to prevent a teacher shortage before the start of next school year.

Education Week. Here’s How Many Teaching Jobs Could Be Lost in Each State in a COVID-19 Recession   If states slash education budgets, Griffith said, school districts would likely lay off early-career teachers first. 

Learning Policy Institute.
1) The Impact of the COVID-19 Recession on Teaching Positions   Recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers is essential for student learning. As a 2019 Learning Policy Institute analysis found, “Investments in instruction, especially high-quality teachers, appear to leverage the largest marginal gains in [student] performance.”
2) Webinar: How Educator Preparation Programs Are Adapting During COVID-19 [recording and slides of Apr. 23 webinar now available]

Mississippi Today. Suspension of teacher license test amid COVID-19 crisis likely to ‘open up some doors’ for potential educators   In late March, the Mississippi State Board of Education suspended multiple requirements for teacher candidates surrounding licensure. For the time being, the Praxis is no longer necessary to obtain a license.

NYTimes. ‘It Was Just Too Much’: How Remote Learning Is Breaking Parents: For the adults in the house, trying to do their own jobs while helping children with class work has become one of the most trying aspects of the pandemic.   Parental engagement has long been seen as critical to student achievement, as much as class size, curriculum and teacher quality… Ms. Landgreen, a teacher, said it can be easier to teach a room full of students than one’s own children.

The 74. Coronavirus Separates Student Teachers From Their K-12 and College Classrooms, Forcing Them to Scramble and States to Change License Rules   Around the country, student teachers face a uniquely challenging situation, physically disconnected from both their colleges and the schools where they expected to be student teaching this semester. Many are unable to finish up final tests for teacher licensure and, like most children, teachers and parents, experienced an abrupt transition to remote learning at both institutions. 

The Teacher Education Podcast. Navigating edTPA with Dr. Lisa Barron

Washington Post. Why history is hard — and dangerous — to teach and how to get kids to stop thinking it is ‘boring and useless’   This inquiry-based history has driven decades of research into the cognition of learning and shaped teacher education. Libraries, archives, and education companies have generated mountains of digitized primary sources for students to examine and analyze. The document-based model has shaped Advanced Placement courses, the Common Core, and policies supported by the National Council for Social Studies.

NEW YORK STATE
NYSED.
1) Acceptance of “Pass” Grades, or its Equivalent, in the Individual Evaluation Pathway to Certification During the Spring, Summer, or Fall 2020 Terms  …the Department will allow any undergraduate or graduate level content core or pedagogical core course, completed during the Spring, Summer, or Fall 2020 terms with a “pass” grade, or its equivalent, to count towards the content core or pedagogical core semester hour requirements for certification through the Individual Evaluation pathway.
2) Statement From Chancellor Betty A. Rosa, the Board of Regents and Interim Commissioner Shannon Tahoe   “In the coming weeks we will form a statewide task force made up of educational leaders, including superintendents, principals, teachers, parents, school board members and other stakeholders, to guide the reopening of our schools…”
3) Vacancy Notice: Commissioner of Education and President of the University of the State of New York   The New York State Board of Regents invites applications and nominations for the position of Commissioner of Education and President of the University of the State of New York.

NYS Governor Cuomo. All K-12 schools and college facilities statewide will remain closed and continue to provide distance learning, meal delivery and childcare services for the remainder of the school year.

NEW YORK CITY
Chalkbeat. Many of NYC’s bilingual special education students don’t get the right services. Remote learning has made it even harder.  People who want to become certified in both bilingual and special education must pursue about 18 to 24 more credit hours of coursework than a general education teacher according to the city teachers union… Through a program with New York City Teaching Fellows, the city subsidizes tuition for special education teachers to get their bilingual certification. The city also helps recruit teachers and covers extra tuition costs at certain colleges for a state program called the Intensive Teacher Institute in Bilingual Special Education. The first cohort started this year with Hunter College, according to the city. 

New York Times. Tadashi Tsufura, Internment Survivor and New York Principal, Dies at 89: During World War II, he and his family were forcibly relocated to Arizona. He later became a beloved educator in New York City.   Unhappy as a chemical engineer, he left for New York City, where one of his brothers lived. Learning of a teacher shortage in the public schools in the early 1960s, he took education courses at Brooklyn College and started a new career. He taught math in two Manhattan schools and was named the principal of P.S. 41 in Greenwich Village, where he stayed for eight years before becoming a deputy superintendent of District 3 on the Upper West Side. 

Washington Post. How a politician with no medical background came to be hyped as ‘the Anthony Fauci of the New York City Council’   He knows schooling from his days as a bilingual math and science teacher in the South Bronx and his time as Teach For America’s New York City director. [Mark Levine is on the NYC City Council representing District 7, including Teachers College and Columbia University.]