Teacher trainees get more face time with students

Written by Colby Sledge, The Tennessean

Tennessee is attracting national attention for a program to get teaching students off college campuses earlier and into classrooms, where they face a wider range of challenges than their predecessors.

As the state works to improve student performance, new teachers are learning a diverse skill set they'll need before entering the classroom. Growing immigrant populations and an increase in learning disability diagnoses mean new teachers will have to know how to deal with myriad issues as soon as they walk in the door.

"Kids are changing. They come to school with many more needs and more complex needs than in the past," said Paula Myrick Short, vice chancellor for academic affairs at the Tennessee Board of Regents. "It's not as if we were doing a bad job preparing teachers, but we realized we weren't preparing teachers for three years down the road, 10 years down the road."

Tennessee Board of Regents universities just completed the pilot year of a plan to require teachers in training to work in schools for an entire year, as opposed to a semester of traditional student teaching.

The students, called teacher residents, take three years of traditional college classes before working in schools during their senior year. Mentor teachers at elementary, middle and high schools will help the students address problems that arise in classrooms, including student behavioral issues and language barriers.

The program is designed to make new teachers feel more comfortable sooner in the classroom, in hopes of creating better teachers who stay in the profession longer.

"We've known for years that a new teacher was not completely finished when they finished the school of education," said Jane Leibbrand, spokeswoman for the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education. The organization has promoted the Tennessee residency program as a national model partnership between K-12 schools and higher education.

"Teachers need support in their first years of teaching," Leibbrand said. "The residency model is a nice combination."

Teacher training is under particular scrutiny in Metro Nashville public schools, which have failed to meet No Child Left Behind standards for five years. A consultant's report in May said higher-quality professional development and better access to training are necessary for the district to improve.

Trial to enter 2nd year

East Tennessee State University and Middle Tennessee State University tried out the program last year to mixed reviews. Some mentor teachers like David Burgin, an economics teacher at Science Hill High School in Johnson City, began to analyze their own teaching methods as residents asked about them.

"There's very little I do that I'm not doing intentionally, but I don't always think about it," Burgin said. "It's more of a reciprocal relationship."

But MTSU graduate Jennifer Collins said she preferred traditional student teaching to her time spent under the residency program at Siegel High School in Murfreesboro, where she taught only three days under her mentor teacher's watch and observed the rest of the time. Teachers were reluctant to consider new teaching methods, Collins said, and didn't show much interest in helping student residents.

"(Teachers) don't really care about you as much as your university supervisor would," Collins said.

Getting teachers on board is a challenge, said Jim Huffman, chairman of the MTSU Department of Educational Leadership. Mentor teachers receive a small stipend for participating in the program - Burgin's was $250 per semester - which would be difficult to increase in a tight budget year.

"It's going to increase the expectation of workload on the public school teachers," Huffman said. "They're going to be partners in this with us, and they'll be taking on the responsibility of training teachers."

If successful, the residency model could become a requirement for teachers to become licensed in the state, said Board of Education Executive Director Gary Nixon.

The state plans to test the program again next year in anticipation of fully implementing it in time for the Tennessee Diploma Project in 2013, a statewide effort to raise standards and improve college preparation. That way, new teachers will implement the reforms with a year's worth of classroom experience under their belts.

"A lot of thinking has been done," Nixon said. "Now it's acting."