Welcome to NEWSWIRE. This monthly e-newsletter has been designed to bring K-12 teacher education and early childhood program faculty in Arizona important news, facts, dates and information that can be shared with students and used to enhance any education environment. NCTE is proud to offer this newsletter as a resource, and values your feedback, input and suggestions. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at ncte@domail.maricopa.edu.
Arizona educators and business leaders overwhelmingly endorse a state board proposal to raise high-school math and science graduation requirements. Beginning with freshmen in 2008, math requirements would be increased from two to three credits. Starting with freshmen in 2009, students would have to take four math and three science credits. Issues still being discussed include specific math course requirements, the cost of requiring extra classes, and teacher training and retention. Flexibility for students with disabilities, English language learners and those who simply are struggling with the requirements are also being considered.
A new report, released by the Institute for Higher Education Policy, and supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), profiles an 11-year successful initiative to improve science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) enrollment and graduation rates at select minority-serving institutions. A Model of Success: The Model Institutions for Excellence Program’s Successful Leadership in STEM Education tracks the range of successful strategies utilized at the schools under the program called the Model Institutions for Excellence (MIE). This report offers a brief summary and outlines the strategies, impacts, and lessons learned through the MIE program to ultimately produce a replicable model for other institutions of higher education and synthesize larger policy recommendations.
Dual enrollment programs enable high school students to enroll in college courses and earn college credit. Once limited to high-achieving students, such programs are increasingly seen as a means to support the postsecondary preparation of average-achieving students. The Postsecondary Achievement of Participants in Dual Enrollment: An Analysis of Student Outcomes in Two States, published by the National Research Center for Career and Technical Education (NRCCTE), seeks to answer several questions regarding their effectiveness by examining the impact of dual enrollment participation for students in the State of Florida and in New York City. Results indicate that dual enrollment is a useful strategy for encouraging postsecondary success for all students, including those in Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs.
A new report by the National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality and Public Agenda examines the special challenges that new middle and high school teachers face. Compared to new teachers in elementary schools, new high school and middle school teachers are less likely than elementary school teachers to say that teaching is exactly what they want to be doing; more likely to report frustrations with student motivation; more likely to be concerned with lack of administrative support in their schools; less likely to believe that good teachers can lead all students to learn; and less likely to say they regard teaching as a long-term career choice. In addition, they are more likely to question the postsecondary preparation they received, and more likely to say that their training put too much emphasis on theories of learning versus more practical classroom issues.
A new ECS Progress of Education Reform reviews four reports developed by the Workforce Strategy Center that make the case for states to implement policies that support the use of career pathways to increase college completion and contribute to state and regional workforce demand. Regional economies will thrive or decline based on their ability to attract, cultivate and retain “knowledge workers”. Career pathways are helpful frameworks for making systemic changes that fill gaps in education and workforce-training systems by addressing the complementary goals of student and worker advancement, and regional economic development.
Status and Trends in the Education of Racial and Ethnic Minorities, a new report from the National Center for Education Statistics, brings together 30-years worth of educational measures statistics to provide a broad-based look at “the educational progress and challenges that racial and ethnic minorities face in the United States.” Progress and challenges are both evident in all categories of assessment, but by virtually every measure used in the report, male students have fallen far behind their female counterparts. Although that development is not new, this report lays out the situation starkly.
Did You Know?
An Inside Higher Ed article, The Real Barriers for Women in Science, highlights a recent National Academies committee report that asserts that women are seriously underrepresented on academic science and engineering faculties because of a mix of “unintentional” biases and outdated institutional policies and structures. The report charges colleges, higher education groups, scholarly societies, federal agencies and others to alter their policies to help improve the climate for women in academic science.Among the findings:
• A series of cognitive and other studies “have not found any significant biological differences between men and women in performing science and mathematics that can account for the lower representation of women in academic faculty and scientific leadership positions in these fields.”
• Although women fall out of academic science at nearly every stage of the pipeline, women are underrepresented on faculties even in fields in which they have reached relative parity.
• Women are “very likely” to face discrimination - sometimes deliberately but often inadvertently - in every field of science and engineering, with minority women often facing a double whammy.
Campus Spotlight Guidelines Showcase your K-12 teacher education or early childhood program activities and accomplishments in the Newswire by submitting the following to ncte@domail.maricopa.edu by the 10th of the month for the following month’s issue.
100-150 word ARTICLE about your program, activity, practice, policy, partnership, resource, etc.; include contact information and a web address if applicable
UPCOMING EVENT title, date, time, place, target audience, cost, sponsoring campus/program(s), partners, etc.
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The information on this Web site is intended to provide information currently affecting or related to the teaching community and community college teacher education programs. Links to other Web sites are provided merely for your convenience and do not constitute or imply endorsement by the National Center for Teacher Education (NCTE). Such external sites contain information created, published, maintained or otherwise posted by organizations independent of NCTE, and NCTE cannot guarantee the accuracy or completeness of information on such sites. NCTE shall not be liable for any damages, including, without limitation, direct, indirect, incidental, special, punitive or consequential damages, that result in any way from your use or reliance on information provided on this site.
