Should Illinois ease the teacher's path to the classroom?

by Jennifer Davis

On paper, alternative certification does look good. There should be a way for career-switchers and retirees to get into teaching.

Steve Tozer has a novel idea. Why not wait until Illinois decides what makes a good teacher before allowing more of them into our classrooms?

All right, so the idea isn't that remarkable. But what one academic sees as common sense runs counter to the thinking of some state policymakers who are looking for faster ways to put new teachers into schools. They're asking another question: Why not make it easier for people with experience in the working world to take up teaching? And they're pushing fast-track "alternative" certification, a route for professionals who want to become teachers without going through the four years of undergraduate schooling required to get standard credentials.

Indeed, 42 states offer some form of alternative certification. And two such programs in Illinois are the kind that bring smiles to the faces of education researchers. Both are Chicago-based and require two or three years of coursework in addition to a supervised internship. But alternative certification can take many forms: everything from a master's degree to eight weeks of in-class training. And that's the problem, say education experts.

As it stands now, any Illinois school district can offer alternative teacher certification if it works with a state approved college or university and it gets the nod from the state teacher certification board. Fast-track proponents would reduce the requirements for individuals who want alternative certificates, and they would make the option more readily available to districts throughout the state.

Where's the controversy? Why should we care? Because, as Tozer, an education professor and chair of policy studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, would patiently explain, Illinois is considering the type of alternative program that researchers frown on. The kind, he says, that lets "teachers learn on the job at the expense of the children."

Eight weeks of intensive schooling followed by a one-year supervised internship is a weakened version of the alternative programs Illinois already has, critics argue. Not so, says state Sen. Dan Cronin. The Elmhurst Republican and chair of the Senate Education Committee wants a fast-track program available statewide, but his effort to convince fellow lawmakers failed this past session — even as a similar proposal covering only Chicago passed.

Cronin, who calls this quick, intensive route to the classroom "a good formula for success," plans to reintroduce his legislation next spring. The Illinois Education Association, the state's largest teacher union, plans to support the plan again because it would help ease a teacher shortage.

Yet academics like Tozer, who assuredly have a stake in university based education programs, view Cronin's plan as a quick-fix for a larger problem: the need to improve teaching. And, "It's not going to fix much, I'm afraid," adds Tozer, who spoke at a Chicago conference on alternative certification and teacher standards. "It's wrong to believe alternate routes are going to solve much of our existing problems with professional preparation and development. But it might satisfy some people who want to see action."

Keying on that desire. President Bill Clinton has called for "a talented and dedicated teacher in every classroom" and says "every child should be able to read by third grade."

He has proposed national standards. His call for national student tests has grabbed most of the headlines, but Clinton also wants to allocate money so that 100,000 new teachers could become accredited by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Congress hasn't warmed to the idea.

Illinois, which recently adopted learning standards for students, is in the midst of adopting stronger teacher standards as well. Illinois is one of a dozen states working with the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future. Gov. Jim Edgar serves on the commission.

Meanwhile, the administration and lawmakers are debating a range of options for reforming schools, including eliminating teacher tenure and mandating homework. Certification is part of that larger debate.

And on paper alternative certification does look good. There should be a way for career-switchers and retirees from, say, a military career to get into teaching. They can bring something special to the profession, everyone

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agrees. And perhaps they shouldn't have to jump through all of the hoops the state requires to become certified requirements the education board has boiled down to a book.

The problem, say critics, is that we may be rushing teachers into the classroom.

"How can you cram four years of aiming — learning about children and how to reach and teach them — into eight weeks?" asks state Rep. Monique Davis.

The Chicago Democrat is a vocal opponent of Cronin's bill and the legislation targeted at her city's school district. An educational administrator, she argues that Chicago needs the most qualified teachers, not ones "who've basically learned how to open a textbook."

Gov. Edgar signed the law last February allowing Chicago to develop an alternative certification program based on eight weeks of training. Yet so far, no school has. Susan Richardson of the state board's professional preparation department says that may be due to an implication that Chicago's students don't deserve the same quality teachers as other students in the state. Perhaps another reason is that there are already two programs in Chicago that draw career-changers into teaching.

One of those, Teachers for Chicago, was launched six years ago. Participants must have a bachelor's degree in something besides education and have at least five years of experience in the working world. The program, according to director Fred Chesek, includes strict screening, then two years of student teaching in a Chicago public school with a mentor while the participant earns a master's degree. An additional two years of teaching in a Chicago public school is also required.

"We're not here looking to find pepole jobs," says Chesek, adding that his graduates include former doctors and lawyers. '"We're looking for people who are really committed to teaching urban kids, and we feel we have a good handle on picking out that type of person."

The DePaul University/Glenview School District program, meanwhile, was a model for Teachers for Chicago. Glenview requires a three-year master's degree and some real-world work experience, but two years instead of five. Student teachers spend a year shadowing a mentor before they're allowed to teach solo.

"Our graduates actually get recruited by the suburbs. That's where most of them end up," says program coordinator Roxanne Owens, who also teaches education at DePaul University. Last year's crop included a landscape architect and a lawyer. "Since they're taking methods courses while they're teaching in the classroom they have the chance to immediately apply what they're learning."

That program has attracted attention across the state, but once school districts learn about the time and cost involved, they back off, says Owens. After all, even with combined resources, DePaul and Glenview can only afford a dozen students at a time.

"The upside of these programs is that they bring people into teaching who might otherwise not consider it," explains Tozer. "The downside is there's evidence we're sending unprepared teachers into our classrooms."

He points to a woman at the Chicago conference who went through the Teachers for Chicago program. "She described in detail what a struggle her first year teaching was. She said she was clueless. And she was a success story. In telling her success story, she confirmed many of our fears."

A recent national study on alternative teacher certification is just as "scary," says Sally Pancrazio, dean of the college of education at Illinois State University, the largest preparer of teachers in the state. That study, which evaluated more than 14,000 teachers across the country, found that alternatively certified teachers appear to have lower academic qualifications than those certified through traditional teacher education programs. Indeed, a small percentage, 2.4 percent, of the "[alternatively certified] teachers had no degrees at all." Additionally, "a large number of fresh college graduates took advantage of [alternative certification] policy to circumvent the traditional teacher education programs." In a recent issue of Education Week, the study's author was quoted as saying:
"Alternative certification ultimately downgrades the quality of teaching."

Linda Darling-Hammond, executive director of the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, says, "Illinois is not a high standards state." In fact, only 14 of the 55 teacher education institutions are nationally accredited. She stresses states are not automatically lowering their standards by offering alternate routes to certification. It can be done right. But not in eight weeks.

And that gets at Tozer's point about standards. Illinois teachers are required to graduate from a state-approved education institution and pass proficiency exams. But Rick DuFour, co-chair of the advisory group developing new state standards for teachers, says it's "very easy" to meet those requirements. Easy enough that someone off the street could likely pass. Proposed new standards, on the other hand, would test for knowledge on effective teaching methods. "We're talking about more than just testing on pen and paper too," says DuFour. For example, prospective teachers may have to perform in front of an expert panel.

Tozer argues the state ought to finish that debate over teacher standards before pushing alternative ways to certify. Nevertheless, interest in alternative certification is surging nationwide. In six years, the number of states with such programs more than doubled, according to the National Center for Education Information. It's surprising, says Emily Feistritzer, director of NCEI, a private education research organization that has tracked this issue since 1990 when it first started to gain momentum. "A lot of states pursued this at first because of an anticipated teacher shortage. But that really hasn't happened and this is still very popular policy."

Why? Because, as Pancrazio believes, "it's an easy thing to do." Tozer sums it up: "Almost no one is satisfied with how we assess our teachers now. Yet, we're talking about alternative teacher certification programs that are even less rigorous. Do we even know enough about the value of these programs to do them? Right now we don't."

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