• Summarize activities and changes based on data that have led to continuous improvement of candidate performance and program quality.
• Discuss plans for sustaining and enhancing performance through continuous improvement as articulated in this standard.Moving Toward Continuous Improvement

Activities and Changes Based on Data That Have Led to Continuous Improvement of Candidate Performance and Program Quality

Based on recommendations of the Interim Report of the Educator Preparation Advisory Council (EPAC) (3.4.e.12) and advice from area superintendents that our candidates would benefit from more clinicians as instructors, the education department chair  reached out to local school districts and recruited top classroom teachers and administrators to teach in the Elementary and Secondary Education programs.These practitioners model and share innovative strategies for differentiated instruction, lesson planning, assessment, and Scientific-based Research Initiative (Connecticut’s Response to Intervention) techniques with candidates and Unit faculty.These school-based educators have collaborated with Unit faculty to align pedagogical courses with innovative practices in our partnering school districts.

In 2010-2011, over 20 teachers and administrators from our partner districts of Danbury and Bethel were involved in monthly meetings to develop a series of embedded clinical experiences for our Elementary Education Interdisciplinary Model (EEIM). The plan was to develop the elementary model, then replicate it with the secondarymodel.

Unfortunately, the EEIM was shelved, along with all new programming, when the new Governor instituted the Connecticut Board of Regents in 2011, and the State Legislature did not approve the new certification standards. However, in Fall 2012, the Connecticut Legislature passed a bill requiring four clinical experiences prior to student teaching in traditional teacher education programs. “All candidates must have a sequence of varied, structured, intensive and purposefully supported clinical school experiences that are appropriately staffed by qualified educators to ensure support for success. Experiences must be across the program, coordinated and support the continuum of content and skill development to become an effective educator” [Interim Report of the Educator Preparation Advisory Council (EPAC) 3.4.e.12].

The Unit continues to develop partnerships with school districts that sustain field experience components of teacher preparation at WCSU. At the suggestion of a partner district with a strong commitment to technology, Unit faculty have embraced whiteboards and clickers in both K-12 and higher education classrooms. Another example is in the field experience planned for candidates in ED 206, Introduction to Education, in Fall 2013. Candidates in ED 206, the first pedagogy course required for all elementary and secondary education undergraduate candidates, enter school classrooms multiple times during the semester to provide one-on-one tutoring and small group literacy and math leadership, giving them an opportunity to experience authentic classroom learning settings over time while supporting district teachers.

Another good example of the mutually beneficial relationship between the Unit and schools in the area will occur in Bethel School District in Fall 2013. Candidates in ED 517, Developmental Reading, a graduate reading course, will create ELL-specific professional development resources for supporting Bethel classroom elementary teachers. Bethel administrators will join the meetings of ED 517 several times over the semester to develop a strong relationship and better understand the needs of the district teachers. At subsequent professional development events in the district, the candidates will demonstrate thedifferentiated instructional strategies they developed. Bethel teachers will share classroom challenges, and the candidates will demonstrate ELL resource toolkits that respond to these case-based challenges as part of the district’s ongoing weekly professional development sessions for all classroom K-5 teachers. Bethel administrators, Unit faculty, and candidates will report on this innovative partnership approach in a presentation titled ELLs in the Elementary Schools: Forging a District-Higher Education Partnership to Rescue Classroom Teachersat the CT-TESOL conference in November 2013.

When a new department chair began in the Fall of 2011, she immediately started to work directly with the Registrar’s office to re-categorize the undergraduate education students more effectively by creating a pre-education major with transition points towards acceptance as an Education major. The new department chair also changed how undergraduate students are advised by faculty. A group of advisors was selected and trained to improve advisement across programs. Furthermore, two members of the education department were recently selected by the provost to participate in the implementation of a student retention advisement tool called MAP-Works which tracks at risk students using a variety of data sources and identifies students who need immediate support to participating advisors.

The Unit has also developed documents to help make the student advisement process for clinical practice more effective a description of steps in the advising process such advisor flow chart documents,  using electronic records in TK20 to review student progress at key transition points and a new Guidebook for the Professional Semester (I.5.a.4.4 and I.5.a.4.5). In addition, the appointment of a new Secondary Education Coordinator has resulted in more frequent communication of advisement issues between education faculty and content area faculty.

Plans for Sustaining and Enhancing Performance through Continuous Improvement as Articulated in Unit Standard 5.

The Unit strives to advance as a collaborative professional community. Despite the addition of funding for reassigned time and research grants over the last number of years at WCSU, finding additional ways of affording faculty time and money to pursue scholarly work is a paramount concern for the Unit. As a university whose primary mission is teaching, the process of balancing assessment data collection, building community partnerships, promoting scholarship, research and creative activity with full academic, service, and advising loads remains an issue the university and the Unit needs to address.

Assuring that all online courses provide students with the opportunity to evaluate instructors and provide feedback on course content, quality of instruction, and other criteria are in development. A systematic approach for student identification in online courses is currently under review.

In order to continuously improve, with the growing ELL population and mainstreaming practices in PK-12 classrooms, faculty across the Unit will need more training on how to incorporate diversity into their courses.
Student feedback on clinical experiences, including faculty evaluation feedback data, needs to be collected more systematically in the future. Specifically, instruments for gathering formal and informal student insights on ways to improve faculty quality, support, and communication (i.e., feedback on performance of classroom teacherswho host teacher candidates in ED 206 and in EPY203/204, PDS mentor teachers, PDS Coordinators, Cooperating Teachers, and University Supervisors.