GLOBAL
Cision. New certificate helps province address COVID-19-related teacher shortage. The Council of the Ontario College of Teachers endorsed the creation of a Temporary Certificate to enable faculty of education students to begin teaching earlier as a partial solution to Ontario’s teaching shortage… Students who are enrolled in an accredited Ontario teacher education program and are expected to complete their program in 2021 can apply. Teachers certified in other Canadian provinces can also apply.
Forum for World Education (WFE). The Future of Teacher Education [Webinar Feb. 23 RSVP]
New Zealand Herald. New on-the-job teacher training scheme delayed as staff shortage ends The latest Ministry of Education projections, released at 11am, show that the supply of primary teachers is expected to fully meet the demand this year and out to 2023, both nationally and in Auckland. The shortfall of secondary teachers, which was expected to be 1750 by 2023 when the ministry’s first projections were published in 2018, is now expected to be only 100, as New Zealanders come home from a Covid-ravaged world to retrain in teaching.
7th International Forum on Teacher Education (IFTE). “Teacher Education: New Challenges and Goals” [Kazan Federal University, Russian Academy of Education May 26-28, 2021]
UNITED STATES
AACTE/SCALE. February 2021 Newsletter – News From edTPA®
Boston Globe. Dr. Miriam A. Marecek, 1940 – 2020. People like her brother’s sixth grade teacher in Atlantic City, Ms. Florence McHale, and her high school home economics teacher, Mrs. Willis had a profound impact on her life and they influenced her creative pursuits and educational ambitions, to teach and to educate teachers. Miriam graduated from Earlham college in Richmond, IN, and received her PHD from Columbia University, Teacher’s College [1978].
Center for Innovation in Teacher Education & Development (CITED). CITED Conversations 2021 [Zoom meeting registration]
Education Week.
1) How Can White Teachers Teach Black History? Six Things You Need to Know: Black historical consciousness requires more than just a pedagogical shift We can use this Black historical consciousness to analyze and refine our teaching of Black history, not just in February but across the whole school year.
2) How School Districts Are Keeping Diverse Teacher Recruitment at the Top of Their Agenda Like countless other school systems across the nation, Florida’s Palm Beach County school district is facing multiple challenges this year: budget cuts, accelerated teacher retirements, a shortage of substitute teachers … support a variety of efforts… and strengthening existing alternative certification and “grow our own” programs.
3) Nurturing Talent at Home to Revive a Struggling Region Bridges created a “grow-your-own” program designed to nurture teaching talent in Edgecombe…With support from philanthropies, the district’s scholar-teacher program pays for dual high school-college enrollment and up to $30,000 in college scholarships for students who pledge to return to the district to teach for at least three years. Students who don’t return must repay the money.
FacultiNet. Assessing the Assessment. Drew Gitomer discusses the technical documentation of and edTPA and score design, the reliability of the assessments, and the consequential impact on decisions about edTPA candidates.
Hechinger Report. How much will it take to reopen, catch up kids, and save public schooling long term?: Billions of stimulus dollars are flowing to public schools, but experts say it may not be enough without big changes to how states allocate funds For instance, Arizona passed Proposition 208 in November …which would raise hundreds of millions to support K-12 education. That money is designated for teachers and classroom support staff, mentoring and retention programs, and the Arizona Teachers Academy, which gives financial support to people earning their teaching certificates in exchange for a commitment to teach in the state.
InsideHigherEd. Setting the Bar Higher A new report from the National Council for Teacher Quality argues that raising admissions standards for teacher training programs can also increase diversity in the field.
National Council on Teacher Quality. Teacher Prep Review: Program Diversity and Admissions 2021 To assess whether teacher preparation programs are meeting the urgent need to diversify the profession, we compared the diversity of their enrollment to the diversity of the current state teacher workforce (reported by the Institute for Education Sciences) as well as the local community in which the programs reside (reported by the Census Bureau). Combining the two measures allows for enrollment to be viewed in the context of where each program operates.
New York Post. Adding wokeness: Oregon promotes teacher program to subtract ‘racism in mathematics’ Attorney M.E. Hart, who has conducted these types of training sessions, told The Washington Post that the training helped people live up to “this nation’s promise – ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’”
New York Times.
1) A College Program for Disadvantaged Teens Could Shake Up Elite Admissions: An education program is immersing underprivileged students in Ivy League classes, and the students’ success has raised questions about how elite university gatekeepers determine co. The early results, Ms. Cornfeld said, are clear: “Our nation’s talent is evenly distributed; opportunity is not.”… An analysis of the most recent federal civil rights data by the Community College Research Center, part of Columbia University’s Teachers College, shows white students enroll in traditional dual-enrollment courses at twice the rate of Black students. And Black and Native American students had the lowest participation rates in Advanced Placement courses, the most widely used proxy for college readiness.
2) Talking About Race and Racism in the Classroom Using The New York Times [Live Webinar Mar. 4]
3) The Influence of a Perfect Teacher: Perhaps because I had a teacher who made reading aloud into ceremony, ritual and compelling drama, I grew up to find my cause in pediatricians’ promoting reading aloud at checkups. Actually, she became Dr. Miriam Marecek in the 1970s when she earned a doctorate in education [Teachers College PhD ‘78], but in my mind, she was always Miss Marecek… Miriam Marecek spent the rest of her life deeply engaged with children’s literature — teaching it to college students and graduate students in education, advising school districts on books and literacy..
New York Times Magazine. Amazon’s Great Labor Awakening: Covid-19 has cemented the e-commerce giant’s hold on the economy — but it has also spurred employees all around the country to organize. Amazon Logistics and Business Management Pathway… Amazon partnered with the school as part of its five-year anniversary in the Inland Empire, donating $50,000 to start the pilot program… The plan, an Amazon spokeswoman told me, is to offer robotics-training mentorships, job-training externships, teacher-training programs and transferable college credits.
InsideHigherEd. Vaccines for Educators — but Not All Educators “The sooner that higher education employees are vaccinated, the sooner we can expand our students’ in-person learning experience,” Michelle Marks, the chancellor of the University of Colorado Denver, said… New York governor Andrew Cuomo’s office did not return a request for comment about the reason for prioritizing in-person college faculty and instructors over other college employees, a decision that has been criticized on equity grounds.
VPM/NPR. Lawmakers Call for Volunteers to Fill Teacher Gap …called on Gov. Ralph Northam to form a ‘Teachers Reserve Corps’ on Monday to address a statewide teacher shortage. Their proposal calls for largely unpaid volunteers to fill in for educators that can’t work in person during the COVID-19 pandemic… The corps would be made up of retired educators, military veterans, college students hoping to become teachers and people licensed to teach outside of Virginia’s K-12 public education system.
WAVY-TV. Black History Month: Hampton’s Little England Chapel stands as an inspiration for freedom According to documents filed with the National Register of Historic Places, the chapel was first “built by students of Hampton Institute, the famous Black teacher-training college founded by Northern missionaries in 1868.”
