EdVANTAGE Blog

Incoming State Education Commissioner David Steiner gained notice for a 2003 research paper criticizing teacher preparation programs for being short on practical preparation.  Since becoming dean of the Hunter College School of Education in 2005, he has been able to convert his critique into practice.

The dean of education at the State University College at Fredonia challenges some of his criticisms, the Jamestown Post-Journal reports.

Dr. Christine Givner, SUNY-Fredonia dean of education said,

”I think he’s right on that that [performance-based assessment] is a critical component of teacher education. What kind of troubles me is that he thinks that the majority of teacher education programs in higher ed still don’t take that seriously.”

The Post-Journal reports,

Dr. Givner said clinical, theory-to-practice experiences occur for students in the teacher preparation programs at SUNY Fredonia from day one. ”They have four semesters of rich field experience that is connected with their coursework even prior to student teaching,” she said. ”I don’t see very many universities where it’s just student teaching – that’s passe.”

At the news conference announcing his selection, Dr. Steiner also questioned the rigor of the state’s teacher certification test.

Noting that 92 percent of students pass the test, Dr. Steiner said, ”We have extraordinary teachers in New York, don’t misunderstand me. Nevertheless, it seems to me that a gateway certification test that has that high a pass rate should give us pause, and we need to take a look at that.”

Dean Givner of Fredonia notes that the test was not designed primarily as a final gateway to gaining certification, however.  Rather, the test’s purposes are to evaluate the preparation provided by teacher education programs and their ability to “weed out” incapable students before they make it that far into the pipeline.

Dr. Givner explained,

”There is a federal law, Title II, that requires that every institution must have at least 80 percent of its candidates in a specific program pass that test, or we will be considered schools of education in need of improvement,” she said. ”If we’re going to change the purpose of the test, then I agree that we need to look at a more rigorous differentiation. But if you analyze the test now, that’s not the purpose for which it’s administered. … This is the federal exit indicator for all teachers in the state of New York that demonstrates that they are competent to become beginning teachers. It would be like shooting ourselves in the foot to have a test where we only have 80 percent of our graduates pass – we should have 100 percent of our graduates passing.”