Category: Teacher Education

GLOBAL
EducationInternational. Statement | EI calls on World Bank to change tack in education   EI and over 170 civil society organisations from across the world call on the Bank to take a clear and principled position in support of free, publicly funded and provided education … it should advocate for teachers to be professionally trained and highly qualified, actively supported and well-resourced. 

EdWeek. Students Learn More From Inquiry-Based Teaching, International Study Finds   “What we saw with respect to gender was the teachers appear to have implicit gender biases and tend to focus more on the boys in the classroom,” … Näslund-Hadley said the countries have since been working to provide more training before and during implementation to encourage teachers to involve students more equitably.

NCEE. Building the Nation Builders: How Singapore Supports Its World-Class Teaching Profession   Recently, NCEE spoke with educators and leaders throughout the system—from an aspiring teacher in the nation’s only teacher preparation program, the National Institute of Education (“NIE”), to the Director-General of Education.

TES (UK). Ofsted to focus on teacher training curriculum  Amanda Spielman says Ofsted’s teacher training checks have been too driven by data, which could have masked weaknesses

UNITED STATES
AACTE.
1) 20 AACTE Member Institutions Receive 2019 Teacher Quality Partnership Grants   Eligibility for the 2019 TQP grants required applicants to have programs designed to prepare computer science teachers as well as the STEM fields overall, and to take place in a Qualified Opportunity Zone as designated by the Internal Revenue Service.
2) Team Wins 5-year, $1.98 Million NSF Grant to Improve Teacher Preparation   A team of Penn State College of Education faculty led by P. Karen Murphy has won a five-year, $1.98 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to improve the preparation of undergraduate preservice elementary teachers.

AAQEP.  2020 Quality Assurance Symposium [Feb. 27, Atlanta]

BridgeMichigan, Fewer Michigan college students want to be teachers. That’s a problem.   Fewer college students are making that choice. Low salaries and negative perceptions of teaching are driving Michigan college students away from teacher preparation programs, hobbling efforts to improve the state’s struggling schools. Fewer teachers with four-year education degrees has also meant more Michigan classrooms led by long-term substitutes, who generally have far less training.

Chronicle. ‘Students Learn Best in Their Preferred Learning Style,’ and Other Neuromyths   There is no evidence, the report says, to support the idea that people learn best when taught in their preferred learning style. In fact, it says, research suggests that “teaching to learning styles may actually hinder learning or affect a student’s self-perception,” 

InsideHigherEd.
1) The Incredible Shrinking Higher Ed Industry: Number of U.S. colleges and universities that award federal financial aid fell by 5.6 percent in 2018-19, to lowest mark in two decades.
2) Warren to DeVos: Drop Navient’s Contract  A judge’s decision in another recent case brought against four borrowers over alleged mishandling of Public Service Loan Forgiveness applications largely went in Navient’s favor.

NCEE. Reviewing OECD’s Annual Report Education Outlook 2019 from a U.S. Perspective [Webinar Video]

Washington Post. Yes, teacher-preparation programs need to be fixed — but more than 350 education leaders say reforms are ‘making things worse’   An alliance of more than 350 deans and other leaders in the field of teacher education issued a major new statement saying many teacher-preparation programs in this country are not working well but that some key efforts to reform them are only “making things worse.”

NEW YORK STATE
NYSATE/NYACTE. 2019 Annual Conference Coalitions of Care in Teacher Education: Educating the Whole Student, Supporting the Whole Teacher [Sept. 16-18] Presentation by S. Reid, K. Ledwell of Teachers College “A Culturally Relevant Approach to Professional Development for Preservice Teachers of Color”

Pearson. New York State Teacher Certification Examinations (NYSTCE).   The New York State Education Department (NYSED) and the Evaluation Systems group of Pearson are seeking candidates … to participate in a field test of items that may appear on future NYSTCE test forms. Field test participants will receive incentives upon verification of participation.

TimesUnion. NY could mandate dyslexia screening in preschool   “Schools of education all too frequently do a disservice by not providing teachers with the skills and knowledge they need to teach reading … it’s frustrating for the teachers as well as the children,” said Dr. John J. Russell, executive director of The Windward Institute, who was head of the school for 13 years.

NEW YORK CITY
Teachers College.
1) Celebrating TC’s Innovative Residency Program: A new federal grant funds TR@TC³   TR@TC prepares TESOL, special education, math, and science teachers to work in high-need New York City public schools through an intensive residency and mentorship program grounded in the Teachers College philosophy of inclusive education. Apply by November 8th and prepare to transform lives in New York City schools.
2) CFP The 37th Annual Teachers College Winter Roundtable: Teaching to Transform; Feb. 28-29 [proposal deadline Oct. 28]
3) EdLab Learning Theater Spotlight: Citizen Scientists Showcase  The Teaching Residents at Teachers College program, known as TR@TC, prepares highly qualified teachers to teach in New York City public schools.
4) Michelle Knight-Manuel is Named Executive Editor of the Teachers College Record   Knight-Manuel is a former middle school ESL/French teacher … her work focuses on college readiness and access, immigrant youth’s civic strengths, and culturally relevant teacher preparation and professional development.

GLOBAL
Education International. World Teachers’ Day: young teachers and the future of education in the spotlight   With the world in dire need of new teachers, valuing and improving the status of the profession to make it more attractive to young people is key to ensuring equitable and inclusive quality education for all.

Eesti Rahvusringhääling [Estonia]. Planned meager salary increase in 2020 not enough, teachers say   Voltri noted that recent years’ salary increases has increased young people’s interest in studying to become a teacher.

Korea Joongang Daily. Technology centers equip students, teachers with skills for the future  All teacher hopefuls need to fulfill 160 hours of mandatory training before they can be sent to schools or community centers in the province or city that request their services. Although they are all exposed to key ideas like block coding and physical computing, teachers are trained in different specialties according to region.

South China Morning Post. Equal Opportunities Commission calls for increased government aid to help Hong Kong’s ethnic minority students learn Chinese more effectively   Hong Kong’s anti-discrimination watchdog has called for more government funding to develop a special curriculum for ethnic minority students and to train teachers in helping non-Chinese-speaking students learn the language more effectively.

The Conversation. Teaching truth and reconciliation in Canada: The perfect place to begin is right where a teacher stands   The Aboriginal Teacher Education Program (ATEP) at Queen’s University that we both work with qualifies graduates for Ontario College of Teachers certification and provides a focus on Indigenous education in their teacher preparation. This program has over 400 primarily Indigenous graduates. We stand in awe of the change they have made at all levels of education; we are excited to follow where this change leads next. We deeply believe in decolonized, self-determined, authentically Indigenized education.

UNESCO. World Teachers’ Day. Held annually on 5 October since 1994, World Teachers’ Day commemorates the anniversary of the adoption of the 1966 ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers. This Recommendation sets benchmarks regarding the rights and responsibilities of teachers and standards for their initial preparation and further education, recruitment, employment, and teaching and learning conditions. 

UNITED STATES
American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. September 2019 – State of the States Legislative Roundup

American Indian College Fund. What Is Stem Without Roots?   Many teachers have felt ill-prepared about addressing cultural knowledge in their classrooms and this often results in a void in the connection to community and impacts children’s beliefs about their abilities in STEM. If classrooms and teacher training programs focus on STEM with only one narrative for its roots, many diverse learners will be disconnected from the field.

Clemson Newsstand. Clemson’s College of Education adopts four-year undergrad advising model amid enrollment gains that defy national trends   From fall 2016 to fall 2019, the college’s population of undergraduate majors increased 19 percent, making it a true anomaly on the national stage when it comes to teacher education.

Education Dive. E is for educator: Sesame Street celebrates 50 years of quality early learning   A former preschool and kindergarten teacher, who now trains future elementary teachers and works with school districts as part of URI’s Guiding Education in Math and Science Network, Sweetman is just one of many educators and researchers who have played a critical, behind-the-scenes role in making sure each scene and lesson is developmentally appropriate and scientifically accurate.

Education Week.
1) Getting Reading Right. Through reporting, explainers, opinion pieces, surveys, and multimedia features, we’ll explore what teachers know about reading and where they learned it, as well as the challenges they face in bringing the research to fruition in K-2 classrooms.
2) The Education Department Is a Little More Popular Than ICE, New Survey Finds  The public’s opinion of the U.S. Department of Education, while low compared to other federal agencies, is evenly split, the latest survey by the Pew Research Center finds, with almost no partisan gap between how Democrats and Republicans view the agency.
3) The State With the Most Charter Schools Just Gave Districts More Power to Reject Them   Charter school teachers teaching outside of core subject areas will have five years to obtain appropriate certification.
4) What Makes a Great Teacher: Pedagogy or Personality?   Generally in teacher preparation and professional development, the focus is on teaching practices and how we can understand our students as learners. But we are rarely called to look at our own identities.

Inside Higher Ed. Middle East Studies Program Comes Under Federal Scrutiny   The letter accuses the center of “advancing ideological priorities” and singles out a teacher-training program in multicultural education in arguing that it uses such programs to “advance narrow, particularized views of American social issues” rather than focusing on language development or the geography, geopolitical issues or history of the Middle East.

Pearson/SCALE. 2018 edTPA Administrative Report. The disproportionate representation of White candidates and the relatively small sample sizes of other groups must be considered when making comparisons or generalizations to other samples or to the general population of teacher candidates.

NEW YORK STATE
NYSED Office of Higher Education. September Newsletter

• Safety Nets for the Science Content Specialty Tests
• New York State Teacher Certification Examinations (Nystce) Preparation Materials
• Edtpa Passing Score Increasing

New York Times. New York Sues Big U.S. Student Loan Servicer for Abusing Borrowers   The lawsuit by state Attorney General Letitia James adds to a growing list of complaints by borrowers and regulators against the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, which operates as FedLoan and American Education Services….FedLoan has “failed miserably” as the sole servicer since 2012 for the federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which excuses borrowers who work in public service for 10 years from repaying their loans, provided they make some qualifying payments.

NEW YORK CITY
Chalkbeat.
1) I never talked about race in my seven years in the classroom. Now I work to make sure future teachers do.   My colleagues and I wanted to create a new kind of training space, one that would put cultural responsiveness front and center. We called it the East Harlem Teaching Residency.
2) City, labor leaders announce deal to close pay gaps for NYC pre-K teachers in Head Start programs   If ratified by members, certified teachers with a master’s degree would see their pay increase by more than $15,500 by October 2021. That would bring their pay to $68,652, in-line with starting salaries for public school teachers.

New York Daily News.
1) Changing the way teachers learn can make all the difference in the classroom  A June proposal by city Comptroller Scott Stringer suggests a yearlong, paid teacher “residency” program that would eventually include 1,000 people a year.
2) NYC pre-school teachers get pay raise to match what other pre-k teachers earn    Certified teachers with Bachelor’s Degrees will go from $48,000 to $62,000. Non-certified teachers and support staff will get a $1,000 bonus when the new contract is ratified.

Teaching Residents at Teachers College. Now accepting applications for the 2020 Cohort. [Info sessions Oct. 10 & 24]

Welcome to Columbia Blogs. Teacher Ed News has migrated from our former blog on Pressible. Watch here for curated weekly news (with active HTMLs) about practices, innovations, policies and politics in teacher education and teacher preparation from credible Global, United States, New York State, and New York City sources. Over 150 weekly postings are archived below.

GLOBAL
Australian Financial Review. Literacy, numeracy and engagement are Dan Tehan’s priorities   The education minister Dan Tehan says he has been working closely with university deans of education to see how he can strengthen teacher education.

Mexico News Daily. Teachers present their ‘social struggle’ education plan to AMLO: Union says president has promised to allow automatic allocation of jobs to teacher college grads   Juan Melchor, a CNTE spokesman, said the president indicated that the automatic allocation of jobs to teaching students could be signed into law, which he said would be a “historic achievement.” However, Marco Fernández, an education specialist at the Tec. de Monterrey, said that enshrining the right of teaching students to an automatic job upon graduation would violate the constitution.

The Irish Times. The Irish Times view on teacher shortages   Financial incentives for students to become teachers in key subjects are also needed along with a system where specialised teachers are employed across groups of schools, as well as remuneration that encourages newly qualified personnel not to emigrate or leave the system.

UNITED STATES
Education Reform Now. A Deep Dive Into Alternative Teacher Prep: New Series will Examine Best Practices, Lessons for the Future

EdWeek.
1) Oregon Schools Rolling Out Indigenous Studies Curriculum   Guenther suggests teachers may also need to unlearn their own bias and personal learning experiences from the past.
2) Wanted: Teachers as Diverse as Their Students   To help students who may encounter financial barriers on their way to earning a teaching degree, some districts and teacher-preparation programs are pouring resources—seed money—into the efforts.
3) When School’s a Battleground for Transgender Kids, Teachers Learn to Protect, Affirm Them   But few professional development providers and teacher-preparation programs show teachers the best practices for working with students of different gender identities.

Inside Higher Education. Scaled-Back HEA Plan Coming Soon?   Alexander, the chairman of the Senate education committee, has said he wants to pass an update to the HEA before he retires after next year… But Senator Patty Murray, the Washington Democrat and ranking member on the committee, has repeatedly said she’s not interested in passing legislation that falls short of a comprehensive reauthorization of the higher ed law.

Murfreesboro.com. MTSU, SCORE sign teacher preparation partnership focused on K-12 innovatio Middle Tennessee State University announced Wednesday (Aug. 28) a first-of-its-kind partnership focused on bringing research-supported innovations to how the university prepares students to become K-12 teachers.

NYTimes. New Mexico Announces Plan for Free College for State Residents: Under the plan, tuition to all state colleges would be free for students regardless of family income.

Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity (SCALE). Call for Proposals, edTPA National Conference 2020 Austin, TX Mar. 26-28 [deadline Nov. 4]

The Atlantic. How to Keep Teachers From Leaving the Profession: After 38 years in education, Judith Harper thinks what teachers are missing is more time to learn from one another.   Decades of research in the United States and abroad show that effective teaching is not an innate skill, but a complex craft that requires a great deal of on-the-job training, including participation in peer networks such as the one Harper coached in. That’s why many high-achieving countries, such as Japan, Singapore, China, and Finland, provide ample weekly hours for this type of professional development. 

NEW YORK STATE
Chalkbeat. New York’s state education commissioner has a new job at a school improvement consulting firm   Elia’s portfolio will be national in focus, according to a press release, and will include community schools that have in-house wraparound services, teacher evaluation systems, standards, school choice, and urban education.

NYSATE/NYACTE. 2019 Annual Conference: Registration Open & Draft Conference Program Available [Oct. 16-18, Saratoga Springs]. 3pm Thurs: A culturally relevant approach to professional development for preservice teachers of color, presented by K. Ledwell, S. Reid, Teachers College

Professional Standards and Practices Board for Teaching.
1) May meeting minutes
2) September meeting agendas

NEW YORK CITY

NYDailyNews. What NYC’s preschool teachers deserve: Unionization would cement their salary parity gains   The new agreement means that certified early childhood teachers in nonprofits will see salary increases ranging from 40%-43% over the next two years, providing starting pay parity with public school preschool teachers. These increases come in response to high turnover and severe teacher recruitment and retention problems among organizations that provide the bulk of New York City pre-kindergarten programs and all center-based early childhood education programs for children 0-3 years of age.

Teachers College.
1) “Equal” is What Matters. “Separate” is Negotiable: TC’s Sonya Douglass Horsford calls for a “radical imagination” of education for America’s new majority  “This redistribution of resources, with less concern on the ‘separate’ and a greater focus on the ‘equal,’ must be used to provide children with access to caring, demanding and well prepared teachers with high expectations, a curriculum that teaches the history of their group, and a supportive affirming environment that fosters self-knowledge, self-confidence and self-respect.”
2) Teach Our Children — About Climate Change: Americans think schools should, finds a survey by TC researchers   “Climate change is a defining issue of our time,” assert Teachers College’s Oren Pizmony-Levy, Associate Professor of International and Comparative Education, and Aaron Pallas, Arthur I. Gates Professor of Sociology & Education…

Walton Family Foundation. Walton Family Foundation Announces Major Investments to Support, Retain and Increase the Diversity of Educators Nationwide   Bank Street Graduate School of Education: To train teacher candidates in the Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Residency Program in New York to address the intellectual, linguistic and emotional strengths and needs of students learning English.

GLOBAL
CBC News. Northern Quebec schools suffer shortage of qualified teachers   Leigh-Ann Gates, chairperson of the parent’s committee in the Cree community of Chisasibi, says she has noticed the increasing difficulty in hiring teachers over her past three terms. She criticizes the move to use unqualified teachers, because they lack training on how to manage students, which can make classroom dynamics chaotic. 

Deutche Welle. Germany: Primary school teacher shortage worse than expected   Bertelsmann suggested that tackling the teacher shortage will require a comprehensive strategy. One solution would be to mentor and certify people who have relevant skills in school subjects and wish to be teachers, but have not gone to university for teaching.

International Society for Music Education. Call for Submissions, 34^thAnnual Conference [Helsinki 2-7 August 2020]

UNITED STATES
AACTE. 72^ndAnnual Meeting Early-Bird Registration [Feb. 29-Mar 1, Atlanta]

Bridge. Michigan teachers: Flunking won’t help kids read. We have better ideas.   Kariainen, the Houghton teacher, said teacher preparation programs could better prepare teachers by spending more time on literacy education. She noted that Michigan only requires six college credits of reading instruction for certified teachers.

Chronicle of Higher Education.
1) What Elizabeth Warren Can Teach Us About Teaching   As instructors, we must choose to be committed to all students, to put their development first, to be led by them, rather than the other way around. This is a political choice — not because we’re trying to get our students to vote a certain way, but because our job is to help students believe in their own possibilities, in their own agency, within a system that far too frequently denies them any.
2) Want to Improve Your Teaching? Start With the Basics: Learn Their Names

EducationWeek.
1) A Perennial Challenge in Rural Alaska: Getting and Keeping Teachers  The Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation, one of two national bodies that accredit teacher training programs, revoked accreditation for all seven of the teacher-preparation programs at UAA, due to the school’s failure to meet four out of five standards set by the group.
2) ‘I Am Pro Good Schools.’ Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate Charter Schools, Equity   Harris also outlined her plan to boost federal funding for historically black colleges and universities in part to build the pipeline of black teachers to public schools, which have a largely white educator workforce.
3) Nearly All Teachers (and Other Public Servants) Who Applied for Loan Forgiveness Were Denied   Last year, Congress expanded a program to forgive the student loans of more public servants, such as teachers. But a new government watchdog report found that 99 percent of people who applied were rejected by the U.S. Department of Education.
4) The Push to Get More Teachers of Color in Special Education Classrooms  …a networked improvement community with 10 teacher-preparation programs that have pledged to find ways to enroll more aspiring special educators and reduce the shortage of special education teachers by fall 2022. A priority is bringing people of color and people with disabilities into the special education teaching ranks.

Hechinger Report.
1) A new teacher vows to help in a classroom full of need: “Under the right conditions, they’d be stars”  The Francis residency was launched in 2016 to recruit teachers who can relate to the struggles of New Orleans students and who ultimately want to create “a more just and humane society.”
2) With a teacher like me, ‘Would I have turned out better?’   … the Brothers Empowered to Teach (BE2T) Initiative. The program recruits college-age people of color, particularly African American men, and pays them stipends to work in schools in New Orleans and Baton Rouge.

Learning Policy Institute. Closing the Opportunity Gap: How Positive Outlier Districts in California Are Pursuing Equitable Access to Deeper Learning  …controlling for student and district characteristics, the most important in-school factors were the qualifications of teachers—in particular having fewer teachers on emergency permits and substandard credentials and more with greater years of experience.

NEAToday.
1) 3 Teachers Tell How They Took On the Civics Gap   But Flores has continued to push for change in how schools understand and implement civics. He served on a state commission on environmental literacy, and is now working with the state university teacher prep program to show how cross-curricular lessons are essential for preparing students to tackle the climate crisis.
2) Educators Need the Loan Forgiveness Program Fixed … Now   An investigation has found that Congress’ recent efforts to forgive the federal student debt of teachers and other public-service workers aren’t working… The stakes also are high for the education profession in general—and the students who need highly qualified teachers to succeed.

Tennessee State Board of Education. State Board Releases Educator Preparation Providers Progress Report   On Monday, the State Board of Education released the 2019 Educator Preparation Providers Progress Report: A Review of Improvements Over Time, a companion report to the annual Educator Preparation Report Card. This report highlights several educator preparation programs (EPPs) that made significant strides on the annual Report Card in the past several years.

Washington Post. What Nashville can teach New York about school desegregation[by TC prof. A. Erickson]

NEW YORK STATE
NYSED Board of Regents.September meetings
1) Appointment of Interim Commissioner of Education and President of the University of the State of New York
2) Appointments to the State Professional Standards and Practices Board for Teaching
3) Proposed Amendment to Section 80-5.17 of the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education Relating to the Conditional Initial Certificate Requirements
4) Proposed Amendments to Section 80-6.1 of the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education Relating to Continuing Teacher and Leader Education for Educators in Nonpublic Schools
5) Proposed Amendment to Section 80-1.5 of the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education Relating to the Creation of Safety Nets for the Science Content Specialty Tests (CSTs)
6) Relating to the Requirements for Transitional D Programs that Lead to School District Leader Certification

Professional Standards and Practices Board for Teaching[new documents posted under resources]
1) Guidance on Establishing and Strengthening Teacher Leadership in New York State
2) Professional Learning Plan – Guidance Document 2019-2020

NEW YORK CITY
Chalkbeat.
1) NYC preschools are training teachers what to do if immigration authorities come knocking
2) Success Academy does ‘screen’ its students. It’s not in the way you might think.  Success Academy issues cell phones to every teacher and requires them to respond to any phone call or text from a parent within 24 hours, but it’s a two-way street. “If we call you, we expect you to return that call within 24 hours,”

Crain’s Keeping New York’s teachers in school: Turnover among the city’s educators is shockingly high   A New York City Teaching Residency would phase in over five years and grow to train 1,000 teachers annually. Rather than being immediately placed in charge of a classroom, residents would be placed alongside an experienced mentor-teacher for a full school year. They would receive a stipend, while mentor-teachers would receive a pay increase.

NYPost. New book tells secrets and surprises of Success Academy’s winning academics   The teachers, he found, are “mostly very young,” twenty-somethings, but Moskowitz has “figured out a way to get new teachers good, quickly,” he says. Success Academy uses the exact same curriculum for each grade, so teachers don’t have to spend hours devising lessons — like city teachers do, Pondiscio said. “They spend all their time preparing how to best teach the lesson and going over students’ work.”

GLOBAL
InsideHigherEd. Recruiting in the Western Hemisphere: Speakers at EducationUSA conference discuss recruitment within a diverse hemisphere.   The Dominican Republic, Mexico and Panama all provide government scholarships for teacher training, while Canada and Mexico have scholarships for short-term, nondegree study.

NYTimes. Mexico: Main Suspect Absolved in 2014 Student Disappearances   One of the main suspects in the 2014 disappearance of 43 teachers’ college students in southern Mexico has been acquitted, a human rights attorney said Tuesday…

Sudbury.com [Toronto] Standardized tests for teachers don’t necessarily improve student scores: report.  Starting at the end of this academic year, new teachers will have to score at least 70 per cent on the test to register with the teachers’ college.

Sydney Morning Herald. $80,000 pay rises in plan to tackle ‘low status’ of teaching in Australia   The plan would introduce scholarships worth $10,000 a year for top school leavers who go on to study teaching. 

UNESCO. eAtlas of Teachers

UNITED STATES
AACTE. Outstanding Dissertation Award [extended deadline Sept. 13]

Brookings Institute. The value of student-teacher matching: Implications for reauthorization of the Higher Education Act [by T. Bristol TC PhD ‘14]  …given the evidence on ethnoracial matching between students and teachers, policymakers working on the HEA reauthorization of must identify the levers available within the purview of that act to increase the number of our nation’s Latino and Black teachers.

Chalkbeat. 6 of the 10 leading Democratic candidates say they will boost teacher diversity. Here’s how.   Strategy #1: Add and expand teacher-prep programs at colleges that serve many students of color Strategy. #2: Fund new kinds of teacher-prep programs Strategy. #3: Tackle prospective teachers’ financial challenges.

EducationWeek.
1) Michael Bennet Releases K-12 Plan, Says Education System Reinforces Inequality  Addressing student loan debt through a variety of proposals, including student loan forgiveness for teachers and other professionals in high-need areas… Improved teacher training and residency programs…
2) Teachers Nationwide Now Have Access to Open-Source Science Curriculum
3) Teachers Still Believe in ‘Learning Styles’ and Other Myths About Cognition   Boser said schools should provide accurate information on the science of learning through those channels, in an effort to combat these myths. But it should start in teacher preparation, he said. “Many schools of education don’t embrace the cognitive sciences,” Boser said. Yet they have a responsibility to prepare teachers to stay abreast of the current research in the cognitive sciences: “It would be weird if large swathes of American doctors believed in bloodletting,” he said.

NYTimes. ‘We are committing educational malpractice’: Why slavery is mistaught — and worse — in American schools.  Middle-school and high-school teachers stick to lesson plans from outdated textbooks that promote long-held, errant views. That means students graduate with a poor understanding of how slavery shaped our country, and they are unable to recognize the powerful and lasting effects it has had.

Phi Delta Kappan. Frustration in The Schools: Teachers Speak Out on Pay, Funding, and Feeling Valued. Education marks the sharpest difference. Ninety-two percent of teachers have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 33% of the general public. Indeed, 58% of teachers have a master’s degree or higher vs. just 15% of all adults.

Washington Post.
1) People do grammar bad. Google’s AI is hear too help.   “Language is part of your heritage and identity, and if you’re using a tool that is constantly telling you, ‘You’re wrong,’ that is not a good thing,” said Paulo Blikstein, associate professor of communications, media and learning technology design at Columbia University Teachers College. “There is not one mythical, monolithical (English) … And every time we have tried to curtail the evolution of a language, it has never gone well.”
2) Teaching America’s truth”  For generations, children have been spared the whole, terrible reality about slavery’s place in U.S. history, but some schools are beginning to strip away the deception and evasions   Many teachers feel ill-prepared, and textbooks rarely do more than skim the surface. There is too much pain to explore. Too much guilt, ignorance, denial.
3) With substitute teachers in high demand, Montgomery County eases requirements   Hoping to broaden the pool of substitute teachers, school system officials have reduced requirements for the job: No longer is a bachelor’s degree the minimum. Now, applicants can qualify with an associate degree or 60 college credits.

NEW YORK STATE
Education Trust. New York’s Future Teachers: An Educator Equity Snapshot

Educator’s Voice. CFP: Vol. XIII – Students with Disabilities: Access and Equity in the School Community [deadline Oct. 1]

NYSATE/NYACTE. 2019 Annual Fall Conference Registration & nominations for Appleby Outstanding Teacher Educator Award [Oct. 17-19 Saratoga Springs]

NYSED
1) Office of Higher Education August Newsletter
a) Deputy Commissioner D’Agati Retiring
b) Guidance on Establishing and Strengthening Teacher Leadership in New York State
c) edTPA Passing Score Increasing in January 2020
2) Professional Standards and Practices Board for Teaching
a) New Website
b) May meeting minutes
c) Guidance on Establishing and Strengthening Teacher Leadership in New York State

NEW YORK CITY
Chalkbeat.
1) A reading ‘crisis’: Why some New York City parents created a school for dyslexic students   Teacher preparation programs aren’t consistently instructing educators on how to best teach children to read, experts said. Most public schools don’t have teachers with extensive training in methods such as Orton-Gillingham — and those that do have them are in short supply…. Jo Anne Simon (D-Brooklyn)…introduced a separate bill that would require all teacher prep programs to offer at least some instruction in phonics-based approaches.
2) New York’s gifted program is at the center of a new round of diversity debates. Here’s how it works.   In such a large system, differences abound among classrooms, said Celia Oyler, a professor at Teachers College who studies how to make classrooms inclusive and challenging for all kinds of learners… James Borland, a Teachers College professor who studies gifted education, questioned whether the programs are uniformly high quality or even that distinguishable for general education classes. 

Education Trust. New York’s Future Teachers: An Educator Equity Snapshot—Teachers College snapshot

Gotham Gazette. Why It’s Time to Re-think Bloomberg Era Gifted & Talented Programming in New York City[by TC Prof. A. S. Wells]   In the predominantly black and Latinx District 16 in Brooklyn, parents fought to bring G&T programs into their schools. Nevertheless, when a new program was added, it was underfunded and low quality in part because the teachers were not well prepared.

Teachers College.
1) Felicia Mensah Will Co-Edit the Journal of Research in Science Teaching   Mensah’s more recent publications include “Finding Voice and Passion: Critical Race Theory Methodology in Science Teacher Education,” published in February by the American Educational Research Journal. That article chronicles the journey of one of Mensah’s Teachers College students from childhood through her first full-time teaching appointment as an elementary school teacher in New York City.
2) Office of Teacher Education Presents “Relationships: The Difference-Maker” 2019 NYS Teacher of the Year Alhassan Susso, Sept. 19 7:00-8:30 [Open to the TC community]
3) Student Profile. Burnishing His Faculties: Music education student Camilo Suárez-Sánchez has been on the other side of the podium  Indeed, his one semester at TC has already changed the way Suárez-Sánchez teaches. “I’m making better decisions by approaching music education from a critical point of view.”
4) TC’s Stephen Silverman Becomes Dean of Florida Atlantic University’s College of Education   During his 21 years at TC, Silverman focused his research on teaching and learning (motor skill and attitude) in physical education … Silverman is the co-author of 18 books on teaching and research.
5) Teaching Residents @ Teachers College Fall Edition Newsletter

GLOBAL
Inter Press Service. Finland’s Education System Leads Globally.  In terms of what other countries, such as the United States should learn from Finland, Dr. Samuel E. Abrams, director of the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education at Teachers College, Columbia University had this to say… Second, we should follow Finland in preparing teachers with high-quality master’s programs in pedagogical theory and practice”…

OECD.
1) TALIS Initial Teacher Preparation study   Australia, Japan, Korea, Netherlands, Norway and the United States, with Wales (United Kingdom), are participating in the study.
2) Teaching, collaboration and the future of education: insights from teachers in the Slovak Republic   …organised by Slovakia’s premier teacher training institute, Metodicko-Pedagogické Centrum (MPC), in collaboration with the OECD, and supported by Teach For All. The forum aimed to encourage greater collaboration among Slovakian teachers, but there was considerable debate around exactly how to create a culture of collaboration in schools. 

UNITED STATES
AACTE. Testifying Before Congress, VCU Education Dean Urges ‘Immediate and Innovative Action’  Andrew Daire, dean of the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth University, testified at the U.S. House Wednesday about how VCU is working to prepare high-quality, dedicated classroom teachers and encouraged Congress to support similar initiatives across the country.

AAQEP. CFP Quality Assurance Symposium, Feb. 27, Atlanta [deadline July 31]

Chalkbeat. How one Illinois program aims to train more resilient, longer-lasting teachers   Students teach in the morning, then attend trainings in the afternoons. They receive a $2,000 stipend — a modest amount, but better than unpaid student teaching positions. Golden Apple requires that participants commit to teaching for five years in a high-poverty or academically low-ranking school. 

EdSource. Plan to expose all students to physics missing one element — teachers   Sixty physics majors graduated from Long Beach State this past school year, according to Galen Pickett, a physics professor at the university. Of those, 10 are expected to go on to become credentialed physics teachers…

EdWeek.
1) Beto O’Rourke’s Education Plan: A Surge in Federal Funds, With Equity Strings Attached   He also proposed providing teachers with student debt relief, working with minority serving insitutions to diversify the teacher workforce, reforming school discipline to decrease racial disparities, boosting school infrastructure funding, fully funding the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, and providing incentives for teachers to seek additional training and graduate degrees.
2) K-12 Dealmaking: Age of Learning Partners With HMH, Pearson Lands Egyptian Testing Contract; ETS and Khan Academy Partner on Teacher Prep   Teacher candidates can use this product to create a personalized learning plan to prepare for the Praxis Core Academic Skills for Educators (Core) test, an exam required by many teacher preparation programs.
3) Teacher-Preparation Programs Again Have a Choice of Accreditors. But Should They?   In one notable example, Teachers College, Columbia University—the first and largest graduate school of education in the country—switched from CAEP to AAQEP and is in the early stages of the accreditation process. “The issue for us fundamentally is that CAEP is a very top-down compliance approach, whereas AAQEP is much more about peer-review—there is really a much more holistic approach to meeting standards,” said Kelly Parkes, an associate professor and the chair of the teacher education policy committee at Teachers College. “We need an accreditation process that would allow us to be flexible and sensitive to our context and our needs. … As a leader in teacher preparation, … you need to have room to have innovation and try [it] out for a year or two, … rather than being cookie-cutter.”
4) To Recruit More Teachers of Color, This District Posted a Unique Job Ad    “We are most interested in finding the best candidate for the job, and that candidate may be one who comes from a less traditional background. We would encourage you to apply, even if you don’t believe you meet every one of our qualifications described.”

Education Writers Association. School Discipline Reform: Easier Said Than Done?  Ask your local colleges’ teacher education programs if they are educating aspiring teachers about techniques to avoid student suspensions. Classroom management is always the toughest part of a new teacher’s job, and recent college graduates may face a particularly hard time if they are unaware of restorative justice or other new strategies many public schools are now embracing. 

New York Times. It’s Easy to Forget, but a Program to Forgive Student Loans Already Exists: Democrats are campaigning to fix an issue that is already starting to resolve itself for many teachers and other public servants.  Since undergraduates legally can’t borrow that much federal money, the forgiveness program is surely dominated by graduate students. A sizable number are most likely public schoolteachers, half of whom have graduate degrees.

Washington Post.
1) Amid teacher shortages, Virginia takes steps to lure students into the profession   The 188,000-student school system has issued teaching offers to graduating high school students who participate in the Virginia Teachers for Tomorrow Program, which aims to attract students to the field of education and help bolster the state’s supply of teachers. The high school students are invited to return to Fairfax as teachers once they have graduated college and become licensed, said Fairfax Superintendent Scott Brabrand.
2) The Mueller report: An educational tool for teachers — and a surprising hit with book clubs

NEW YORK STATE
New York Post. Regents get set to guarantee even more bad New York schools   This follows a sustained drive by the Regents to reduce teacher-training standards, water down state tests, abandon efforts to hold teachers accountable and on and on.

NYSED Board of Regents. Appointment of Deputy Commissioner for P12 Instructional Support VOTED, that the Board of Regents approve the appointment of Dr. Kimberly Young Wilkins to the position of Deputy Commissioner for P12 Instructional Support.

NEW YORK CITY
Chankbeat. NYC ditched its school turnaround program months ago. Principals are still wondering what comes next.   Teachers at the same school received training from Teachers College to improve writing instruction, which the principal linked to gains in student performance. But it’s unlikely, the principal said, that the school will continue the training for new teachers without the financial support of Renewal given other competing demands on the school’s budget.

City Journal. Classrooms of the Absurd: New York’s public school system embraces social-justice education theories—even as the city’s successful charter schools show what really works.  It’s complete nonsense, as is so much of the effluvia now leaking from America’s graduate schools of education, such as “implicit classroom bias”—the notion that white teachers can’t instruct black students without first having subconscious racism washed from their brains.

NYDailyNews. Non-unionized Pre-K teachers say new pay raise leaves them in the cold   At least for now, the pay raise City Council Speaker Corey Johnson heralded as “historic” only applies to about 300 certified, unionized teachers. Another 1500 non-unionized educators with identical credentials, according to city estimates, are still waiting to hear if and when they’ll be included.

Philanthropy News Digest. Columbia’s Teachers College Receives $6 Million for Dance Institute   “As a result of Jody’s foresight, commitment, and generosity, there are now generations of new certified dance teachers teaching in K–12 schools and a growing corps of faculty at universities and colleges,” said Barbara Bashaw, TC’s Arnhold Professor of Practice, director of the Dance Education Program…

Teachers College. Making Dance Education an Institution: Jody and John Arnhold Give TC $10.45 Million to Advance Dance Education Nationwide   These relationships will inspire new thinking and scholarship and foster professional networks and standardized practices to further formalize pre-K-12 dance education and teacher preparation as a field of academic study and inquiry.