(Page 1 of 5) - A Partnership to Improve Urban Education authored by Finnan, Christine. and Welch, Frances.

Section I: Content

A. Statement of the issue.

AACTE has selected the focus “Creating New Visions for Teacher Preparation” because
of the urgent need to improve both teacher preparation and school quality. Problems in
these areas are most acute when teacher preparation and teacher quality intersect in urban
and rural schools that serve large populations of low-income, minority students.
Improvements in either teacher preparation or school quality are impossible to sustain
without improving the other. Efforts to improve teacher preparation and school quality
are rarely linked, and when they are, they often fail because true partnerships between
teacher preparation programs and schools are rarely established. Even when partnerships
between preparation programs and schools are established, gains are difficult to sustain
because partnerships do not embrace business and civic groups, all elements of the higher
education community, and district and state education agencies in ways that build on the
strengths and interests of these parties. The proposed roundtable discussion builds on the
experience of one teacher preparation program’s partnership program designed to involve
all players in an urban community to improve student achievement at an inner-city high
school and middle school while also better preparing future and experienced teachers to
work in these settings.

The call for new visions for teacher preparation is in response to a number of issues.
First, there is a lack of confidence in traditional teacher preparation, especially in its
ability to prepare teachers to teach in urban and rural schools. Second, few models exist
for sustained interaction between teacher preparation programs and public schools,
resulting in mismatches between goals and values of the two institutions, and often
leaving too many new teachers with little support. Third innovations in school structure
and governance (e.g., turnaround schools, takeovers, charters) are occurring which have
an impact on the context in which we prepare teachers and on the expectations of
teachers. Finally, community resources are underutilized and our candidates don’t know
how to identify and access resources. All of these issues put us in a position to examine
teacher preparation in light of new alliances.

To create new visions we need to broaden our alliances and cut down on the separation of
teacher preparation from P-12 schools, other departments on IHE campuses, and the
business and civic community. Partnering with all of these entities in an effort to serve
failing schools, we are able to better serve the students in the schools, provide innovative
opportunities for pre-service and in-service teachers, and connect entities that typically
play a marginal role in this process in a meaningful way. In addition, we give candidates
an opportunity to see beyond traditional preparation and traditional school structures.

B. Literature review.

The literature clearly supports efforts to link improvements in teacher preparation with
efforts to improve schools. The recently released report from the Joint Task Force for
Urban/Metropolitan Schools (American Association of State Colleges and Universities &
National Association of State Universities and State Land-Grant Colleges (AASCU &
NASUSLGC), 2004) provides a concise call for all members of higher education and K-