Effective professional development (PD) can be a powerful tool in school success and teacher satisfaction; however, teachers often report their PD experiences as lackluster or not responsive to their immediate needs (Desimone, 2011; Guskey, 2009; Lutrick & Szabo, 2012). Teachers need professional support in today's educational environment to…

In an era of standardized exams to support No Child Left Behind, the influence a teacher candidate has on a P-12 classroom can greatly impact the academic achievement of students. The National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Educators (NCATE) Blue Ribbon Panel Report (2010) suggested that teacher preparation programs and school districts need…

This article is a report of the findings from a sample of approximately 2,700 students and 1,000 faculty in the first 50 Teacher Education Accreditation Council (TEAC)-accredited programs for which the online surveys were used. The sample represents nearly all the full-time faculty members surveyed and approximately 30% of the students. On the…

Because there is limited research on effective early field experiences and, particularly, on the potential of laboratory experiences to expose teacher candidates to a diverse student population, this study evaluates one such placement. As part of the placement, the teacher candidate provided tutoring at an on-campus model alternative program for…

The literature is sated with calls for more and better communication between home and school. Teachers believe that parents should be more involved, but seem at a loss as to how to make that happen, and parents often feel disconnected to their child's teacher and the school. Few would argue that it is the responsibility of classroom teachers to…

This article examines the sustained impact of a workshop series held to support faculty engagement in program assessment in the College of Education at California State University, Long Beach. The four-part series, held monthly during spring 2008, was intended to enhance faculty understanding of their role in assessment of student learning at the…

Recruiting, preparing, and retaining high quality secondary mathematics and science teachers are three of the most critical problems in the nation's urban schools that serve a vast majority of children from socially and economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Although the factors contributing to these problems are complex, one area that has caught…

Perhaps one of the most controversial topics in the field of teacher education today is what constitutes an effective preservice program for preparing individuals to instruct students in the twenty-first century. A discussion of the merits of the approaches to teacher certification has also been compounded by issues relating to legal mandates such…

Despite the complex emotional and interpersonal challenges inherent therein, credential students often comment that their student teaching experience had the greatest influence on their development as new teachers. An essential component of teacher education programs, the field experience serves many purposes. Although the theoretical potential…

In 1998, the California legislature passed Senate Bill SB 2042 which replaced the previous teacher certification legislation. The new law required that all elementary and secondary teacher certification programs in the State of California align their programs with new teaching standards. These standards included Teacher Performance Expectations…

California's teacher preparation program enrollments have declined steadily in both Multiple and Single Subject programs since 2001. A Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC) report shows a decline of 48% among Multiple Subject and 18% among Single Subject enrollees in teacher preparation programs in the state between 2001 and 2007. Currently,…

Traditional measures of teachers' competency have been widely criticized for their lack of authenticity and predictive validity. There is little evidence regarding the technical soundness of traditional teacher licensure tests and little research documenting the validity of such tests for identifying competent teachers or effective teaching.…

This study aims to begin to uncover the detailed ways that pre-service elementary teachers examine and understand mathematics teaching, the grain size at which they do so, and what constitutes evidence of teaching mathematics for understanding for pre-service mathematics teachers. Thus, the central research questions for this study are: (a) What…

Assessing the preparation of preservice candidates for quality teaching, both for mainstream students and for ELs, requires reliable and valid assessments that pay close attention to context, process, and reflection, factors that traditional evaluations of teaching either ignore or undervalue. In this article, the authors focus on one high-stakes…

Today, the term "quality" cannot be used without evidence--evidence of learning for teacher candidates, and evidence that these teachers impact their young learners. In response to this call for evidence, teacher education programs are currently developing assessment systems that emphasize the analysis of data to make educational decisions about…