Financial Aid and Student Employment
Historically, Illinois has not had and does not have professional standards that describe what it expects teachers to know and be able to do, except as may be inferred from the content of required preparation courses and the assessment of basic skills and subject-matter expertise. Since the launch of the report, What Matters Most: Teaching for America's Future, by the National Commission of Teaching and America's Future (NCTAF) September 12, 1996, the state of Illinois is one of 11 states that has established state partnerships with NCTAF. In other words, the state reached to the discernible movement of transforming its current teacher preparation and training sequence into a stronger professional teacher development system. The transformation is expected to result in the improvement of teacher recruitment, preparation, induction, certification, professional development and retirement. In the Fall of 1996 the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) adopted the ILLINOIS FRAMEWORK, which was designed to provide direction for the transformation.
One of the state's major initiatives in this transformation endeavor involves nine universities and their respective colleges of education. Each selected college of education has agreed with the state to participate in a Pilot Project allowing it to "break the mold" of the past and redesign its teacher preparation program(s) around Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) and National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) standards. The pilot sites are also encouraged to develop assessment of teaching performance procedures and induction programs based on the work of INTASC. It is expected that prototype models will be developed and that these models will cast the molds for future Illinois structures to build teacher recruitment, preparation, licensure, and continuing professional development practices.
Illinois State's College of Education is one of the nine state institutions selected by the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) to participate in the pilot study and development of models to address this new statewide agenda. Illinois State is one of the largest teacher education institutions in the United States. The largest undergraduate program in the College of Education is that of elementary education, with a total of over 1500 majors at some point in the program during any given academic year. The largest undergraduate program in secondary education is that of history education, with over 300 majors currently in the program. The University decided to focus its study on implementing INTASC standards into these programs.
Currently, three faculty members in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction are primarily responsible for the planning for the development of the new model for elementary education. They have begun to engage other university faculty in this process and have established a partnership with Glenn Elementary School in Unit District #5, Normal, Illinois. The partnership collaborates as equal partners to develop and implement a Professional Development School at Glenn as a pilot model program. Preliminary plans include a cohort of 24 freshmen students enrolling in Elementary Education for Fall 1998 being recruited to this program. These recruited students will begin as volunteers in the partnership school during their first semester at Illinois State. Subsequently, students will do much of their professional course work in the school where knowledge, dispositions, and experience can be gained under the auspices of the partner institutions. Additionally, support and assessment of standards-based performance - by practicum students for the first three years and as interns during the senior year - can be provided.
Dr. Fred Taylor:
Dr. Marilyn Moore:
Illinois State University
Department of Curriculum and Instruction
Normal, Illinois 61790-5330