The Tensions of Teacher Prep - the money version

One of the things I have become very aware of over the past month is the incredible cost of preparing teachers. Our institution only prepares them at the master level, thus we get to work with our candidates for the equivalent of only 2 years. During that time, our current program has them out in the field for student teaching for a single semester of this time, though there are a few opportunities for them to be in the field earlier.

The new CAEP standards, as well as a lot of research on teacher preparation, support having the students in the field a lot more than this. Based on my own experience and observations, I agree with these recommendations. Among other things, prospective teachers need to be in the schools from the first day of their program so that they can see what they are learning in action and so that they can understand what the life of a teacher is really like. Hollywood and memories from one's own schooling are not a sufficient basis on which to make a decision about entering the teaching career. This is because a lot of what a teacher does is invisible to students and not sexy enough for Hollywood (these things include meeting with parents, filling out progress reports, working with students at 7a.m. before school starts because it's the only time you can get them, only having 20 minutes for lunch AND having to watch your students while you eat, etc.)

The reality of universities at this point, though, is that money is super tight. So, the resources needed to support high-quality field experiences are simply not there. Consider student teaching. Just one semester of this requires a university-based supervisor for about every 5 students, a mentor teacher for every student, mileage for university supervisors to observe students, training staff to support the technology needs around the electronic portfolio that is necessary for program accreditation and for the student's job hunt, and someone to teach the seminar that typically accompanies student teaching. To recruit mentor teachers, we have to provide some kind of incentive. Some universities provide course waivers, some provide stipends. Either way, there is a real price tag attached. Plus, the university-based supervisors who are assigned in a 5:1 ratio which is about 3-5 times the number of faculty to students we have in the classroom. In short, it's a very expensive proposition. This leaves me, as a new chair, wondering how we possibly make up for this expense. We do charge a special fee of our student teachers, but it doesn't even cover the mentor teacher's incentive much less mileage and the university supervisor.

As a nation, we are fixated on making sure teachers are good by testing them and testing our students. Yet, we seem unwilling to put the supports in place that are likely to lead to good teaching. Field experience is a proven pathway for high-quality results. Yet, the persistent budget cuts to universities leave us having to make decisions about what can be done that are based on fulfilling the minimum expectations of the accrediting agencies rather than on doing what we know will work. And, we have to fight to even hit these minimum expectations. If we want high quality teachers, we need to find ways to make high quality programs. And, high quality programs have very real expenses attached to them. There has to be some way to make that clear to the people who hold the purse strings.