Campus Grants
The S. D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation is supporting non-NGEI campuses with small grants to help teacher preparation program teams, in collaboration with district partners, to better understand a current process in their teacher preparation program. Investigations address the questions: What outcomes is this current process getting? What level of variability does this process produce? How might you better understand the causes of variability, if any? The activities of the grant are designed to align with the framework of improvement science, and grantees are using improvement science methods in their work. WestEd is providing process support. The powerpoint of a November 27th webinar about the NGEI grants is here and the recording of the webinar is here.email
Campus Projects
Cal Poly Pomona will investigate the knowledge university supervisors and cooperating teachers have about learning outcomes for their program and the type of teachers they aspire to develop with a goal of utilizing the information to align the candidate feedback loop with the program’s outcomes, pedagogy, best practices, and the needs of teacher candidates and TK-12 students.
Contact: Janeen Volsey
CalStateTEACH will examine its existing practices related to the recruitment and retention of a diverse candidate pool toward the end of increasing the number of individuals of color entering and successfully completing their program in order to more closely align with the diverse student demographics that teachers serve across the state of California.
Contact: Ernest Black
With a focus on identification of prioritized skills, CSU Dominguez Hills will study whether the knowledge and skill sets that they are providing candidates in coursework and field experiences target the most important and impactful practices that ensure PK-12 students are being educated in equitable and inclusive learning environments.
Contact: Laurie Inman
CSU East Bay will examine candidate placement processes in partner districts, with an emphasis on how districts’ values, priorities, and needs lead to healthy, educationally rich learning experiences for teacher candidates, cooperating teachers, and the students they serve.
Contact: Eric Engdahl
The aim of the Humboldt State University investigation is to better understand issues of recruitment and retention of teacher candidates in the Humboldt County area. The project team hopes to gain a deep understanding of current processes for recruiting diverse candidates who will remain in the area to teach after earning a credential and more effectively serve the local Native American communities. The project team also seeks insights into the needs of district partners related to retaining diverse teachers.
Contact: Libbi R. Mille
CSU Los Angeles will examine processes for assigning teacher candidates to schools implementing inclusive practices and identifying and assigning skilled mentor teachers to candidates. To better understand mentor teacher selection and support, the Los Angeles team will work closely with LAUSD to collect and analyze data from a variety of sources. Andrea Zetlin may be contacted for information.
Contact: Andrea Zetlin
CSU Northridge will build on its current efforts to diversify the Multiple Subject teacher pipeline - recruiting and retaining men of color in the teacher preparation program and a partner school district -- by investigating processes for recruitment of men of color in secondary education and special education and women of color in multiple credential programs on the campus.
Contact: John Reveles
In order to engage in more systematic collaboration with partner districts around the identification of prioritized skills, CSU San Bernardino will examine how courses and clinical experiences work together to ensure candidates’ mastery of classroom practices that support equitable and inclusive environments for all learners. Contact Kathryn Howard for information.
Contact: Kathryn Howard
The goal of the San Diego State University project is to explore recruitment and retention of students of color in their teacher preparation programs. The project team aspires to better understand the effectiveness of their current processes as well as the choices that students of color make regarding attending SDSU once they have been accepted to the campus.
Contact: Lynne Bercaw
San Francisco State University plans to work closely with San Francisco Unified School District to analyze the processes and practices of cooperating teacher selection and support, and student teacher placement, across the Multiple Subject, Single Subject, and Education Specialist programs. Grounded in the belief that the student teaching experience is central to teacher preparation programs, the project will strive to better understand current processes with a goal of strengthening this key apprenticeship experience for all teacher candidates. Contact Cynthia Grutzik for information.
Contact: Cynthia Grutzik
San José State University will examine processes of mentor teacher selection and support. One focus of the investigation will be on the role of the mentor in supporting under-represented minority candidates, particularly male candidates, in the Multiple Subject Credential Program. The project team will conduct empathy interviews with mentor teachers, partner Human Resources administrators, and credential program graduates to better understand mentor teacher selection and support and how candidates experience their program.
Contact: David Whitenack
CSU San Marcos seeks to develop an understanding of what their teacher candidates experience during their first year of teaching, in which skills they are most successful, and where they struggle. They also seek to understand what administrators and district leaders value in first-year teachers. An analysis of a variety of data is planned to provide information about candidate skills, knowledge, and dispositions and insights into how to better prepare candidates for their first year of teaching.
Contact: Ingrid Flores