The Importance

All of our nation's children need to be well educated—not only for moral reasons, but also because our country depends on it. Failure to provide all children with a sound education is unacceptable in this information age in which education is essential to both a sound economy and a viable democracy. The strong public schools that give us a healthy nation depend on quality teacher education. All our efforts to improve student learning depend on better teaching in schools throughout the country.

Institutions of higher education—the engines of education reform—have the power to produce better teachers. After all, since all teachers have college degrees, these institutions educate and train every school and college teacher in America. While the responsibility for improving education nationwide falls on many shoulders, colleges and universities play a particularly important role. It is time for higher education as a whole to accept the responsibility for teacher education that it abdicated to colleges of education earlier in this century.

For higher education institutions, the overarching challenge is to bring the preparation of teachers back to the position it once held in American higher education—as a core mission function that involves all segments of the campus and has the active support of top university leaders. Campus chief executives, provosts, and even trustees must be willing to create and sustain the changes in policy, structure, and practice that result in a focus on quality teacher preparation throughout an institution. To be successful in meeting the needs of students, teacher preparation reform must be comprehensive, must involve the entire college or university, and should be sustained over time by a set of campus-wide values that become embedded in the institution's culture.

The Issues

The following comments, intended to present a variety of viewpoints about the challenges that presidents face, helped to provoke thoughtful discussion among the Summit participants.

• Teacher education's history has led to many of its current weaknesses. During this century, we have seen the transition from Normal Schools to research institutions, as well as the states' increased reliance on colleges of education to shape teacher preparation.
• The preparation of teachers has been marginalized on many campuses, buried under the weight of other priorities that receive more support from faculty and from university leaders.
• Reforms come with political and financial costs. Inertia and built-in rigidities inhibit reforms.
• Schools of education have struggled unsuccessfully to earn respect within the higher education culture. They suffer from "prestige deprivation" and "second-class citizenship."
• Organizational barriers and incentive systems impede collaboration across the campus in preparing teachers. Teacher education operates from a position of a "splendid isolation" that is neither a splendid nor a useful isolation.
• Faculty involvement in K-12 schools, from education and from arts and sciences, is not recognized and rewarded. An emphasis on tenure, scholarship, and research have led to the neglect of K-12 schools, particularly those in the inner cities and rural areas.
• Higher education has not done enough to contribute the tremendous power of its research and scholarship to answer key policy questions faced by the K-12 schools near them.
• Teacher education programs are often cited as "cash cows" within universities. Traditional funding systems are inadequate.
• Schools of education often have higher student/faculty ratios than other schools.

Tough Questions to Consider

The following were the kinds of questions that presidents were asked to consider before coming to the Summit.

• Does teacher preparation—as a campus-wide function—have status on my campus consistent with other key mission functions?
• How is teacher education funded at my institution?
• Have I made commitment to high-quality teacher preparation a major factor in making policy decisions, setting budget priorities, and choosing deans and faculty at my institution?
• Does the tenure process at my institution reward faculty who teach undergraduates and undertake related work in K-12 schools?
• Do faculty members throughout my institution see educating teachers as one of their main missions?

Next Steps

These are complex issues central to the current debate over student achievement in the United States and the future of higher education. In discussing what can be done to address them, the presidents and chancellors at the Summit generated the following action steps. They are examples of steps that presidents have taken, or steps that presidents could take, to demonstrate their commitment to elevating teacher education on their campuses.

• Ask publicly whether the university wants to be committed to a strong college of education. If the answer is yes, be willing to support it with the resources it needs.
• Make arts and sciences deans equally responsible for the success of teacher preparation programs. Establish reporting lines to the provost or to the president that bridge the organizational barriers between discrete college units.
• Redefine scholarship on campus for promotion and tenure decisions and faculty merit salary rewards. Recognize that faculty assignments involving field activities with cohort groups of students take more time than teaching a campus-based class.
• Examine and revise the balance expected of all faculty in teaching, service, and research activities so that the expectations held by the university are consistent with its stated commitment to high quality teaching and teacher preparation.
• Examine the expectations of senior and junior faculty regarding the work of K-16 partnership building and outreach to the schools. If they are inadequate, make appropriate changes to teaching loads, reward systems, and budget allocations to departments and to colleges.
• Identify and implement ways to use the budget as an effective tool to leverage change at the college and department levels.
• Move the department of education to the "signature building" on campus. This relocation will give value to the department and will provide a powerful message to both the community and the institution regarding the importance of the department.
• Institute university-funded scholarships for students who enter the teaching profession, sending a clear message about its value.
• Define the mission of the institution in terms of service to the region in which it sits, and drive the teacher preparation programs toward this mission.
• Consciously take opportunities to be advocates for teacher preparation programs, which often suffer from low comparative prestige within universities. Stress their critical role in serving society and their consequent centrality to the mission of a strong university.
• Declare that the institution's main responsibility is to improve public schools. As chancellor, give system presidents a "carte blanche" to reform, which can lead to a turnover of deans and the redesign of most programs. If programs are of poor quality, note this publicly.
• As chancellor, increase enrollment, secure more funding, and allocate it to teacher education. In order to receive increased funding, presidents within the university system will need to do more teacher education.
• Make a statement about how a president spends his or her time by making as many school visits as possible. Do not underestimate the symbolic value of what a president says and does.
• Announce up front that for the entire campus, teacher education is a priority. Most faculty have children and so are interested in the quality of the schools.
• Establish as a priority the equipping of education faculty with technology. This will give a strong message regarding the importance of the department.
• Institute a policy that education programs must be nationally accredited.
• Require faculty to develop an annual professional development plan that reflects their work with schools and children as well as with university students.
• Have a discussion with the provost regarding the mission of the institution.
• Compile data about children and education in the community and use them to captivate people and to raise their interest in supporting a focus on teacher education.
• Work to ensure a strong statewide system because improving teacher education cannot be sufficiently addressed one institution at a time in some states.
• Speak out about the need for a cultural shift in the appreciation of teachers, for higher teacher salaries, for higher standards, and for throwing out the current "byzantine" licensing requirements and creating better ones.
• Play a greater advocacy role in order to influence policy that affects teaching and to uncover the scandalous "dirty little secret" about underprepared teachers and states' willingness to grant waivers. (States would never waive requirements this way in the health professions.)
• Write an op-ed on public policy and teaching.
• Encourage colleges of education to declare charter schools of education. These are places that "go for broke" and depart from the pack.
• Use external funding as a catalyst for change.
• Invest in faculty development.
• Tweak the institution's governance so that it provides an overall structure that addresses long-term concerns.