What do we want from the State?

There is a group of deans and directors of teacher education, RIACTE. We have met twice, trying to find our way into a more engaged relationship with the State agencies in general, and RIDE in particular. That we want a seat at the table, and contribute to solving the State’s education problems, is a given. It is a little more difficult to figure out what is it we – meaning all teacher preparation programs - really want from the State. From my point of view, we don’t want too much:

1.       A sensible and less burdensome state approval process. What we have right now is an outdated, excessive bureaucratic exercise spelled out in an 83 page document. It consists mainly in providing a host of different charts, almost entirely on inputs. If we at least could use our national accreditation (which can also use some streamlining, no doubt) for the purposes of state approval, it would give us a gift of productive time. It is not that we don’t want to be regulated; not at all. We just do not want to produce mountains of useless paperwork, that’s it. Something closer to the audit model would work much better. Come and see what we do – talk to graduates, read our internal documentation, our reports, our data, and make an informed judgment on the integrity of our programs. Instead, we are asked to produce things we do not normally use for our operations, and things that are unlikely to improve the way we work. This encourages cynicism and discourages professional responsibility.  As we prepare to submit all of the needed information electronically, it becomes less and less clear why RIDE wants to send 20 people to review us, and why do they insist in staying in Providence hotels. Why not review all materials online and just send 2-3 people to talk to faculty, partner schools, and to our candidates.  

2.       We need a support system to follow up on our graduates. Teacher preparation should be a system for long-term professional training, which integrates pre-service training with meaningful induction and professional development. Right now, there is no meaningful state-wide induction system, and no professional development system. It is very difficult for us to conduct any follow-up activities, not just because no funding exists to support it, but mainly because there is no system to tap into.  (We cannot even get information on how many our graduates were hired, and where they work. Eventually, we are supposed to get data on student performance linked to teacher identifiers, which in turn should be linked to their teacher preparation program. That would be a very interesting research data, but I doubt it can be readily used to evaluate quality of our programs.)

3.       The State is planning to revise its teacher certification, which is probably a good thing. We would like an opportunity to discuss some clear distinction between initial licensure and added endorsements, mobility between types of licensure, etc. In general, an opportunity to provide input in policy decisions would be welcome. Policy-making is a messy business, and often leads to unintended consequences. Teacher certification changes may lead to revisions in multiple programs, which is very costly, and tend to distract us from program improvement. A simple opportunity to provide input into the process is quite vital to our work.

There are probably other things we need and want. In the end, we want to be useful, and treated as a partner and as resource rather than as an obstacle and a passive object of regulations.