The New York State Board of Regents intends to require new teachers to exhibit capability in the classroom and prove that they can improve test scores before they can gain certification.
According to State Education Commissioner David Steiner this is being planned so that it can be determined whether or not teachers are good in practice as well as being good on paper. Steiner has said he has known of many city teachers who do well with their coursework and certification exams but perform poorly in the classroom.
Final certification would be given after three years of teaching.
Some education experts said that while state officials have acknowledged the correct problem: getting highly qualified teachers into high needs schools- they are uncertain if this proposal is the solution. According to William Baldwin, vice provost at Columbia University's Teacher's College "When you want to attribute learning to a specific teacher it's extremely complicated."
Source: The New York Daily News (11/17/09)
Comments
Teaching is more than just knowing the subject but also knowing how to transmit that knowledge to others. LIke engineering, accounting, law or medicine, it needs a hands-on internship program to complete the process of training a teacher and in Canada we have a two year internship before you get professional certification even after you got your university degrees. But asking that all patients survive, all legal cases be won, or all students improve test scores is not reasonable. There are other factors at work besides a highly skilled teacher, lawyer or doctor. I am very wary of teacher merit being tied to test scores. I have taught gifted kids who entered the room scoring 95. I have taught handicapped kids who could not even formally write tests anyway> I have taught immigrant kids who though very smart in their language could barely compose a sentence on a test in our language. Good teachers adjust the lesson to the student and we must let them.
I hope this proposal doesn't get far. It's true you cannot determine teacher capability in the classroom by whether or not a specific teacher can improve test scores. There are other factors to consider. NYC seems to want to make standards impossible for prospective and current teachers and if this proposal goes through let's see how easy it'll be for the city and state to attract good teachers. Big mistake!
There are many factors behind the success of a student, one of which is the ability of the teacher to communicate his or her lesson in a way that kids will understand. I'm all for having truly qualified people in the front of the classroom. As a former teacher myself, I think that these other factors involved play an equally large role: A supportive school administration, proper teacher resources, professional development and most importantly, the support and caring of parents that want to ensure that their child succeeds.
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