Willis D. Hawley

Making a Difference in Educational Quality Through Teacher Education

Is teacher education beneficial and worthwhile? What standards are being established for admitting students to teacher education programs? What is the relationship of these standards to teacher effectiveness? These questions and others implicit in the debate regard ing the efficacy of teacher preparation programs are discussed by Evertson, Hawley and Zlotnik. The authors review the extensive body of research surround ing preparation programs, make propo sals for strengthening teacher prepara tion, and offer words of caution to those endorsing many of the popular proposals for teacher education reform, including advocates of alternative credentialing.

The Consequences of school desegregation

A solution to get the problem off, have you found it? Really? What kind of solution do you resolve the problem? From what sources? Well, there are so many questions that we utter every day. No matter how you will get the solution, it will mean better. You can take the reference from some books. And the the consequences of school desegregation is one book that we really recommend you to read, to get more solutions in solving this problem.

The Contribution of School Desegregation to Academic Achievement and Racial Integration

It seems reasonable to assert that, in the last 30 years, no social policy has been as divisive as school desegregation. And few would argue that the numbers of minority and white leaders actively pursuing the goal of desegregation has declined from a decade or more ago. But the issue will not go away, and advocacy persists for at least two general reasons. First, on balance, and even though both massive and passive resistance have been more common than genuine efforts to make it work, school desegregation has benefited most of those who have experienced it. Second, the problems that school desegregation was meant to address are still with us in many communities, and social policies likely to be more effective in remediating them are not in evidence.

Should We Extend Teacher Preparation

A s the attacks on teacher education have increased, one reform strategy seems to have gained the most adherents: the proposal to require teacher candidates to have at least five years of preservice education rather than the four now typically needed for certification. The fiveyear teacher preparat ion movement, which encompasses many programmatic variations, has powerful proponents. Among them are a special task force of the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education (AACTE), the majori ty of the members of the National Commission on Excellence in Teacher Education, and the Carnegie Forum on Educat ion and the Economy. The Holmes Group, which includes the deans of schools of education at most of the nations research universities, publicly calls for would-be teachers to complete five years of college and an internship before teaching full-time. Many leading schools of education (such as those at the University of Chicago and Stanford University, and Teachers College, Columbia University) now offer teacher training opportunities only at the postbaccalaureate level. Remarkably, this movement to increase the years of preservice educat ion for prospective teachers has been proceeding apace without serious opposition, despite the probabil i ty that it could decrease both the number and the quality of teacher candidates at a t ime when we expect a severe teacher shortage. Moreover, there is no evidence that ex tended p repara t ion programs make beginning teachers more effective. One reason that extended programs have not been subject to more criticism is that they come in so many shapes and sizes. Here, I am concerned with any strategy that requires students to take a m i n i m u m of five years of college-based coursework (which could inc lude pract ice teaching) before they are allowed to teach at full salary. The case for extended teacher preparat ion programs rests fundamental ly on criticisms of undergraduate programs rather than on documented benefits for postbacca laurea te preservice t eacher educa t ion . A m o n g the attacks on undergraduate programs that appear most to inf luence demands for this p roposed reform are the following:

Book Reviews: Choice and Control in American Education, Vols. 1 & 2: William H. Clune and John F. Witte (Eds.) London: The Falmer Press, 1991, 416 pp., Vol. 1, 443 pp., Vol. 2.

These two volumes are composed of papers and commentary presented at a conference held in mid-1989. The two volumes need not be read (or purchased) together, though they are complementary and their contents overlap. Volume 1 deals broadly with the debate over various strategies for providing parents with greater choice in the schools their children attend. Volume 2 is more of a smorgasbord of contemporary issues that are related to choice but that could be, and often are, considered separately—such as magnet schools, school-based decision making, decentralization, teacher empowerment, and desegregation. Both volumes are long on theory and speculation and short on hard evidence. And, as the authors by and large acknowledge, the available evidence is sparse and is often methodologically limited. Nonetheless, these are important books, well worth reading.