Ed Schools' Pedagogical Puzzle

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/education/edlife/edl-24teacher-t.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&hp

At Relay Graduate School of Education they are doing things differently. Instead of lectures and traditional courses, graduate students will mainly be mentored at their schools and focus on teaching techniques that they can “use on Monday”. There have been many complaints lately that teachers are unprepared for the classroom- even though they may be certified or have a Master’s degree. Relay, a spin off of Teacher U which was founded by leaders from Achievement First, Uncommon Schools, and KIPP to train their teachers, seems to be following the national trend of emphasizing practical instruction over academic study in order to vastly improve teacher education. Students are not even allowed to receive their master’s degree until they have submitted a portfolio proving that their own students have made at least one year of academic progress.

While there are many supporters of this kind of teacher education, critics worry about several factors of the Teacher U/Relay model. Some say that it will add unneeded competition in a time of budget cuts and teacher lay-offs. However, the main criticism is that it dumbs-down teacher education and that the focus on pedagogical context has teachers following protocol without intellectual rigor. Though I would argue many teachers find daily classroom struggles much more challenging and “rigorous” than their traditional master’s coursework. Others are not so much concerned with the methods of Relay but rather that resources could be better spent on monitoring and supervising existing graduate schools rather than saying “let’s just toss it to the side and create something different”.

The goal of Relay’s leaders, though it may not be achieved, is to move their model beyond just servicing the charter school world. They hope to have half of their students be traditional public school teachers who can benefit just as much from the techniques and strategies, including those of Doug Lemov, that Relay focuses on. I think that many teachers would be in favor of this type of education; however, as Linda Darling-Hammond warns, with anything new “we risk learning on other people’s’ kids”.