(For other posts on this topic see the category for “Fed Teacher…” on the right.)
The public comment period is now over. I submitted the following suggestion. (This is the link to all public comments.)
My recommendation addresses the heart of the problem in teacher preparation – especially for high school teachers: Future teachers are rarely taught sufficient content.
This problem doesn’t stem from schools of education, or any other particular part of institutions of higher education. It stems from unaccountability in almost every aspect of higher education. That unaccountability lets colleges gain reputations that are almost independent of their educational value, and puts in positions of power those who know best how to acquire those reputations.
If there is any expectation that the “…requirements for the teacher preparation program accountability system result[s] in…meaningful data on teacher preparation program quality…” (from the SUMMARY), then data on content preparation must be acquired directly. After the following brief summary of what I have seen in over twenty years of teaching math, at both an “elite” school, and at a state regional school, I will suggest a way to acquire vital information on the quality of programs.
(All of the following are described and, in several cases documented, on my blog www.inside-higher-ed.com .)
I have seen a professor at an “elite” school get funding for a “national need” program, and grant a doctorate to a math student who had trouble with first year math problems.
It is not uncommon for students like this to become “professors” at state regional colleges.
Here are some examples of “professors” (mostly produced under government initiatives in the 60’s.) who were not competent to teach future high school teachers. They all taught at a state regional school.
A professor who taught a low level course (discrete math) said that, after five years, she could always tell when the problems were wrong, but she couldn’t always tell what was wrong.
A professor who taught statistics thought a simple fact (the sum of normals is normal with the same…) was the Central Limit Theorem – the most important theorem of probability.
One professor didn’t understand functions and more.
A Chairman of the Math Department had trouble with concepts of third year college math.
Finally, even at some “elite” schools courses are taught to satisfy student “wants”, not “needs”. (See “A Tale Out of School” on my blog for documented details of such a case.)
Our high school teachers don’t have a chance of learning enough to teach well in these circumstances. If the above behaviors can’t be observed and changed, there is little hope of improving education in America – except for an exceptional few.
Here is my suggestion.
I recommend that nationwide tests of teachers’ knowledge of content be given and recorded, but ONLY by college. The teachers’ names should be anonymous since it is rarely their fault that they didn’t sufficiently learn. I believe such a public database will go a long way toward cleaning up education at the college level, and improving it at the high school level. Everyone would be a winner.
Thank you.
Recent Comments