Alternate Routes To Teaching

Describes alternative routes to teaching, covering how they were developed, national programs, and state certification requirements.

Over the past 20 years, alternative certification for teachers has emerged as a major avenue of teacher preparation. The proliferation of new pathways has spurred heated debate over how best to recruit, prepare, and support qualified teachers. Alternative Routes to Teaching provides a thorough and dispassionate review of the research evidence on alternative certification. It takes readers beyond the simple dichotomies that have characterized the debate over alternative certification, encourages them to look carefully at the trade-offs implicit in any route into teaching, and suggests ways to “marry” the proven strengths of both traditional and alternative approaches.

Criticisms of teacher education, the low economic and political costs of trying to reform schools by reforming teacher education, along with the difficulty of filling some teaching positions with persons certified in traditional ways, have fueled a movement to create alternative routes to teacher certification in the vast majority of states. This monograph seeks to inform the ongoing policy debate over when and for what purposes alternative certification of teachers should be employed and to develop lessons that might lead to increasing the effectiveness of both alternative certification and traditional programs of teacher preparation. Following an introduction, the publication consists of six articles: (1) "The Theory and Practice of Alternative Certification: Implications for the Improvement of Teaching" (Willis D. Hawley); (2) "Alternative Certification in Connecticut: Reshaping the Profession" (Traci Bliss); (3) "Alternative Certification: State Policies in the SREB (Southern Regional Education Board) States" (Lynn M. Cornett); (4) "Los Angeles Unified School District Intern Program: Recruiting and Preparing Teachers for an Urban Context" (Trish Stoddart); (5) "Teaching and Knowledge: Policy Issues Posed by Alternate Certification for Teachers" (Linda Darling-Hammond); and (6) "The Place of Alternative Certification in the Education of Teachers" (Gary D. Fenstermacher). Selected references for each chapter are included. (LL)

Revised and updated guide for prospective teachers with increased detail about the realities of teaching in a changing demographic society, post-pandemic life, societal changes brought about by technology, and the current political moment in education. Real challenges. Real choices. And very real consequences. That’s what today’s classrooms are about. That’s why Marleen Pugach’s Because Teaching Matters, Third Edition depicts today’s classrooms as they truly are, while highlighting the enormous impact teachers have on students’ lives. The book is organized around five professional commitments— learning from multiple sources of knowledge, using the curriculum responsibly, practicing equity-minded teaching, meeting the needs of individual students in the context of the classroom and school community, and contributing actively to the profession. The third edition focuses on: The current landscape and challenges of supporting multi-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-lingual and multi-ability classrooms across socio-economic levels, and the relationships among students, families, communities, and educators The latest academic approaches for teaching students who have disabilities, leveraging modern classroom technology, the role of legislation and funding, and updates on the current context of teaching and teacher preparation New post-pandemic societal and educational contexts Classroom and school reflections on practice, written by current teachers and teacher leaders in real classrooms and real schools, showing authentic best practices in action. Ideal for Foundations of Education and Introduction to Teaching courses designed to provide preservice teachers with an overview of the profession, Because Teaching Matters, Third Edition tells the story of today’s complex classrooms. It also drives home that, though the decision to teach is a serious one, it is one that can be extremely rewarding.

Co-Published by Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group and the Association of Teacher Educators. The Handbook of Research on Teacher Education was initiated to ferment change in education based on solid evidence. The publication of the First Edition was a signal event in 1990. While the preparation of educators was then – and continues to be – the topic of substantial discussion, there did not exist a codification of the best that was known at the time about teacher education. Reflecting the needs of educators today, the Third Edition takes a new approach to achieving the same purpose. Beyond simply conceptualizing the broad landscape of teacher education and providing comprehensive reviews of the latest research for major domains of practice, this edition: stimulates a broad conversation about foundational issues brings multiple perspectives to bear provides new specificity to topics that have been undifferentiated in the past includes diverse voices in the conversation. The Editors, with an Advisory Board, identified nine foundational issues and translated them into a set of focal questions: What’s the Point?: The Purposes of Teacher Education What Should Teachers Know? Teacher Capacities: Knowledge, Beliefs, Skills, and Commitments Where Should Teachers Be Taught? Settings and Roles in Teacher Education Who Teaches? Who Should Teach? Teacher Recruitment, Selection, and Retention Does Difference Make a Difference? Diversity and Teacher Education How Do People Learn to Teach? Who’s in Charge? Authority in Teacher Education How Do We Know What We Know? Research and Teacher Education What Good is Teacher Education? The Place of Teacher Education in Teachers’ Education. The Association of Teacher Educators (ATE) is an individual membership organization devoted solely to the improvement of teacher education both for school-based and post secondary teacher educators. For more information on our organization and publications, please visit: www.ate1.org

This collection of narratives, stories, and case studies brings to life examples of policy processes that affect teacher educators' work, goals, and accomplishments, including certification, testing, allocation of policy responsibilities, standards, and resources. Gideonse, a veteran participant in teacher education policy struggles in many different arenas, has provided an invaluable service by pulling together representative contributions that sample recent policy initiatives from state and Federal agencies, special commissions, teacher education units, and professional organizations. He clearly details the complex interplay of climate, role, structure, assumptions, issues, and players in each episode. This selective combination of diverse types and voluminous amounts of data provides support for teacher educators seeking to more fully realize their professional aspirations and make more productive contributions to the policy debates that affect them.