Higher Education's Involvement in Supporting Teacher Quality

As many people know, TN received $500 million to support education.  As a part of our effort at the United Way, we've been trying to use this as an opportunity to ask people to think about how THEY can be a part of helping to directly supporting teachers in the classroom, as they're often the key to ensuring that children receive an excellent education.

This morning, I attended a meeting that was called by the Tennessee Higher Education Commission in order to help higher education think about how they can support the "Race to the Top" and "First to the Top" reforms happening in TN.

Think of it like this...
Students will be up against higher standards.  Teachers are the ones teaching students the higher standards.  Colleges and universities teach the teachers.  They need to help teachers learn about the new standards.

About 50 higher education leaders today, from Roane State Community College to Lincoln Memorial University to the University of Tennessee, came together to think about how higher education can help through these transitions.  There were several concrete things that were shared...(which goes back to the question, "How is this money being spent?")

- Integrating Common Core Standards into Pre-Service Teacher Training (Training college professors to teach the new standards): $1,350,000
- Integrating TVAAS (value added assessment system) into Pre-Service Teacher Training: $1,350,000
- School Leaders Supply and Demand Study (looking at what kind of demands will be on Tennessee's education and what kinds of teachers we need to meet those demands): $172,800
- UTeach Program Replication (getting college students studying math and science connected with teaching EARLY, like as freshmen or sophomores): $4,104,000 (find out more here http://www.state.tn.us/thec/Divisions/AcademicAffairs/uteach/uteach.html)
- College Access and Success Network (creating a college-going culture in Tennessee): $3,240,336 (there's a conference Nov. 4 and 5 in Chattanooga, if you're interested--linked above)
- Teacher Preparation Program Effectiveness Report Card (trying to design a helpful tool for colleges so they can know how well they're preparing teachers): $432,000
- STEM professional development (to help teachers get better at teaching Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math areas): $6,480,000
- Tennessee Consortium on Research, Evaluation, and Development (to help guide education policy based on research-based practices): $3,240,000.  Being run by Vanderbilt's National Center for Performance Incentives. 

Find more details here: http://www.state.tn.us/thec/Index/rttt/THEC%20&%20RTTT.pdf
Some more information can be found here: http://www.tn.gov/firsttothetop/programs.html

I'm saying all this to prove that HIGHER EDUCATION has been asked to step up their involvement in helping support teachers and overall educational improvement.

Who will be the leaders who step up in higher education to make sure that these things get done? The community should encourage these important institutions to really take leadership on helping teachers be the best they can be and to be accessible to school systems.

Wanted to pass on a news clipping that talks about how a faith-based effort in Knoxville, the Emerald Youth Foundation, got involved in supporting schools and making a difference: http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2010/sep/25/after-school-program-leading-to-results/

Keeping the conversation going...