Schools of education are increasingly under attack. In a speech delivered at Teachers College, Columbia University, in 2009, education secretary Arne Duncan charged that the nation's schools of education were "doing a mediocre job of preparing teachers for the realities of 21st-century classroom." Although teachers unions have borne the brunt of the criticism, particularly since the release of the documentary "Waiting for Superman," schools of education have been held culpable for what is increasingly regarded as a crisis in teaching. Some schools of education have done a fairly good job in meeting the many challenges involved in preparing teachers. However, even in the education schools that are frequently cited as the best, the gap between the training that student teachers receive and their experience in real classrooms is often too wide. Schools and districts bear some of the responsibility for contributing to the problems faced by new teachers because they often assign the newest teachers to the neediest schools and classrooms. For this reason, it is important to examine what schools and institutions of teacher education can do to support teachers and increase their effectiveness, especially in urban schools, where the challenges are frequently the greatest. Schools of education can establish long-term partnerships with public schools, wherein they commit to providing on-site training, supervision, and support to new teachers during the first 2 to 3 years of service. As Goodlad (1984) envisioned, these partnerships schools can serve as laboratories that develop, refine, and model best practices in teaching and learning for other educators. Over time, such an approach would make it possible for universities to increase the number of young people graduating from high school prepared for college and so make it possible for universities to play a role in developing the civic capacity of the communities where they are based.