Summer Practicum: Extending the Partnership for Pre-Service Teachers to a Local High School

Abstract

Teacher educators and their students (pre-service teachers) are not always able to be involved in partnerships with local high schools and their students. This paper describes such a partnership with a local high school in which pre-service teachers from a university’s college of education completed their practicum hours over the summer in advance for their fall classes. My dual role in this partnership as a professor in the college of education and as the director of the summer partnership is discussed. This study also examined the impact of this summer practicum partnership on the pre-service teachers. My participation in the program increased my belief in local school summer partnerships and the benefits of experiential learning for the pre-service teachers as we worked through the scholarship of application (Boyer, 1997). The pre-service teachers cited their benefits in the areas of more real-life teaching experience, collaboration with their mentor-teachers, and a welcoming feeling from the local high school.