Alternative routes to teaching become more popular despite lack of evidence | Hechinger Report

Alternative routes to teaching become more popular despite lack of evidence | Hechinger Report:

Alternative routes to teaching become more popular despite lack of evidence

by Jackie Mader

 

INGLEWOOD, Calif.—In the back of a tenth-grade geometry classroom on a recent morning at Washington Preparatory High School, nine miles southeast of Los Angeles, Landon Yurica and Alycia Jones bent over the papers in front of them. At 23 and 24, respectively, the two could almost blend in as students as they tried the assignment the high school students were working on: finding the surface area of a geometric shape. Yurica and Jones are teachers-in-training with the Urban Teacher Residency, a partnership between the Los Angeles Unified School District and four southern California universities, which provides an alternative route to the classroom. The program takes three semesters compared to an average of six semesters in traditional programs for students who start as undergraduates, and two for post-baccalaureate programs. It also demands a commitment of at least three post-preparation teaching years from its participants. It is one of an expanding pool of alternative programs capitalizing on the belief that the more experience an aspiring teacher has in a classroom, the better. The number of alternative programs nationwide has skyrocketed, rising from 70 programs in the 2000-2001 

Do new exams produce better teachers? States act while educators debate

by Jackie Mader

NORTHRIDGE, Calif.— It took less than a minute for Mario Martinez to finish the first six questions of the algebra exam that his professor, Ivan Cheng, had just handed to him. The high school-level test was supposed to be a good example of an exam, so that the graduate students in Cheng’s math methods course at the California State University, Northridge’s school of education would better understand what rigorous high school-level questions look like, and how to write tests for their own lessons. By the end of the first page, Martinez had already learned an important lesson: “Beware of redundant problems,” he scribbled on the side of his paper 

California struggles to assess teacher training programs

by Jackie Mader

NORTHRIDGE, Calif.—On a recent afternoon at California State University, Northridge, Nancy Prosenjak was attempting to quiet the graduate students spread out across conference tables in the back of her classroom. She was still missing nearly a third of the class, but she was eager to debrief with her students about their first day of student teaching.
“You’re still smiling, this is good!” she told her students as the chatter died down. A few stragglers trickled in, wearily making their way to their seats.
The 17 students had spent the morning in classrooms spread across North Los Angeles and would devote the rest of the afternoon to discussing their experiences in Prosenjak’s supervised fieldwork course, a class