Induction and Mentoring

The Rossier School of Education offers advanced degree and professional development programs both online and on-campus, including a master of education in advanced instruction, that specifically aim to strengthen the knowledge and skills of current teachers and administrators who work or wish to work in urban schools. Rossier students specialize in one of four areas: special education (differing abilities); elementary or secondary science, technology, engineering, or mathematics education; or secondary humanities.

The Metropolitan Multicultural Teacher Education Program (MMTEP) specifically serves the needs of diverse students in Milwaukee’s public schools. It recruits a high percentage of minority candidates who are currently paraprofessionals into a postbaccalaureate alternate route that involves a short course of summer training, followed by placement as teachers of record and a year of collateral coursework and mentoring leading to certification and a guaranteed teacher contract in the Milwaukee Public Schools after program completion. 

This 2008 publication from The Aspen Institute discusses the clinical residency model of teacher preparation as both an effective preparation strategy and a direct response to the problems of teacher recruitment and retention in high-need schools. Urban teacher residency programs generally have high percentages of minority graduates who are specifically trained, through strong partnerships with urban schools, to be successful teachers in those schools after graduation. The programs continue to mentor and support new teachers for several years after they take full-time positions.

The Arkansas Partnership for Teacher Quality—a consortium involving Arkansas educator preparation programs—the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, and the National Education Association conduct a periodic survey of graduates of the state’s educator preparation programs within their first five years of program completion. The survey is a rich source of data on teachers’ postgraduate teaching experience and their views of how well their preparation programs prepared them for teaching careers. 

This 2010 report of the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education Blue Ribbon Commission stresses the central role of clinical practice in reforming teacher preparation and recommends that educator preparation programs include inservice development of their graduates as part of their responsibility to ensure their effectiveness in the classroom. 

The UTeach Institute was originally founded at the University of Texas–Austin to provide a high-quality teacher preparation route for top science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students. Now a national program replicated on numerous campuses, UTeach is a specific response to the need for increasing the number of STEM teachers in the pipeline.