If "Greatness past Pattern," the hot-off-the-press report by State Superintendent Tom Torlakson'south Task Force on Educator Excellence is going to accept any legs, the country Commission on Instruction Credentialing may provide the start, of import steps.

The Commission oversees the preparation and initial on-the-task grooming of teachers and administrators, and, to a lesser extent, the equitable placement of teachers in the classroom. Many of the dozens of recommendations in the Task Force'south report, released terminal month (come across coverage hither), would fall within its purview.

At the Commission's coming together terminal calendar week, Executive Managing director Mary Sandy said the Committee'due south piece of work was in sync with many of the recommendations.

"A lot of reform reports come out and some seem at cross purposes with this torso, but this study represents a harmonic convergence," Sandy said. "We are already in process with so much of this work."

Linda Darling-Hammond, co-chair of the Task Force on Educator Excellence and vice chair of the Commission on Teacher Credentialing, discusses the Task Force recommendations at a Commission meeting last week.

Linda Darling-Hammond, co-chair of the Task Force on Educator Excellence and vice chair of the Committee on Teacher Credentialing, discusses the Job Forcefulness recommendations at a Commission meeting last week.

This is not all that surprising. The co-chair of the Task Force, Stanford University Professor of Education Linda Darling-Hammond, is besides vice chair of the Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC), and many of the central recommendations in the written report reflect policies she has advocated for years. Beverly Young, vice chancellor of California State University and a CTC commissioner, too served on the Chore Forcefulness, as did 4 members of the Teacher Training Advisory (TAP) Panel, which advises the Commission.

The report'south recommendations will serve to reinforce what the Commission is already considering and could spur action on areas information technology's still discussing, Sandy said. These include:

  • Revising instructor and administrator grooming standards to include the Common Core standards that the country adopted two years agone. Information technology's critical that credentialing programs instruct new teachers in the content noesis and teaching methods needed to teach Common Core. A draft of new standards will get to the Commission in December or January;
  • Strengthening instructor preparation in areas of loftier need: teaching English learners and students with disabilities. The Commission must decide whether a credential for education special education students should require a general teaching credential as a prerequisite. That'due south not required at present, but in that location'south an statement that special pedagogy teachers need a broader content and pedagogical background than the specialized credential requires. At the same time, the Commission will consider streamlining the process for credentialed teachers to get an additional special ed credential – especially useful for giving laid-off teachers an opportunity to return to the classroom;
  • Rewriting standards for an administrative credential, perhaps including internship requirements and a new performance assessment that volition show what aspiring principals can exercise in a schoolhouse setting in the areas of school leadership and mission, collaboration, and didactics, not just what they take learned in courses. California currently doesn't crave a credential to become an administrator – 1 can examination out – and the standards for programs offer credentialing need to be greatly strengthened. The Job Strength report made this a priority.
  • Creating  valid functioning assessments that all teachers graduating from credentialing programs must have, and then ultimately using the results of these assessments as a factor in accrediting the teacher credentialing programs. California created the first functioning assessments for aspiring teachers, in which they demonstrate planning lessons and  really teaching. Simply there are three different models that credentialing programs in the state use, with a fourth coming. There must be more uniformity if they are to be used to determine the effectiveness of college and academy credentialing programs.
  • Eliminating a xl-year requirement that an teacher candidate obtain a credential in ane twelvemonth while encouraging colleges to offering more instructor preparation courses at the undergraduate level. Only the Legislature tin lift now outdated requirement that teachers have all courses in one twelvemonth, though the Commission can brand the instance for it. Teaching requirements are much more extensive than they were in 1970; teachers can't fit all of them in a year and do effective internships. At the same time, the Committee could encourage colleges to offer five-twelvemonth programs tied to completing some requirements as undergraduates.
  • Taking a stronger hand in monitoring districts to see that fully credentialed, highly qualified teachers are equitably distributed. The Legislature and Department of Education decide penalties and sanctions, just there may exist a more than active role for the Committee.
  • Reinvigorating mentoring and training programs for new teachers, BTSA (Beginning Instructor Back up and Assessment) chief amidst them. Cuts in state funding and funding flexibility have led this once-model programme to languish in many districts.

And BTSA is not alone. Equally Darling-Hammond noted in summarizing the Task Force written report, that California has created model  programs, like BTSA, Leadership Academies, and Peer Aid and Review, a mentoring program for underperforming teachers, only to see them terminated or reduced in tough upkeep years. This "yo-yo effect, to start, then yank a programme, is incredibly wasteful," Darling-Hammond said.  "California innovates well just how do nosotros build a system to ensure that teachers and leaders have skills they want and demand, and students accept access to these staff?"

The state should reinstate its "pioneering" programs as money becomes available, she said, starting with, she said in an interview, funding unemployed teachers' 2nd credential  in special education and other shortage areas,  and restoring incentives for teachers to consummate their National Lath Certification and and so commit to teach in high-needs areas (they received $twenty,000 spread out over four years under the previous plan).

Instructor training and professional person development programs take declined during the by five years, as the Legislature immune districts flexibility to spend money as they cull. Gov. Jerry Brown is proposing to go along local flexibility with the distribution of coin through a weighted pupil formula, even as education funding rises substantially.

Darling-Hammond disagrees. She advocates that the country require districts to spend money on professional person development while allowing districts to cull which programs "from a basketful of options."  Otherwise, she said, the whole system of training and sustaining teachers and leaders will autumn apart. "There must be a coherent professional person learning plan in this state."

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