Underqualified Teachers Research Articles

Teachers’ Competency in Responding to the Needs of Learners with Barriers to Learning

The government’s decision to implement Inclusive had a range of challenges to facilitate smooth implementation. This required teachers to have specialised training, skills and competencies to adequately address the learning needs of learners with disabilities. Poorly trained and under-qualified teachers compromise not only the educational ethos but the overall organisation and application of inclusive education in our schools. The aim of this paper was to investigate whether teachers have necessary skills and knowledge in responding to the needs of learners with barriers to learning. Qualitative research was employed in this study. In this study, the interviews and group discussions were used to find out whether teachers’ have necessary skills and knowledge in responding to the needs of learners with barriers to learning. Purposive sampling was used as a method of sample selection. Full service school primary teachers formed the core focus of the participants. The sample consisted of the teachers who are directly involved in the implementation of inclusive education. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2013.v4n13p143

‘It will make me a real teacher’: Learning experiences of part time PGCE students in South Africa

The province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa has a recent estimate of 8000 unqualified and under-qualified teachers. Some of these teachers have an undergraduate degree, but do not have a professional qualification. In order to become professionally qualified, teachers with a degree must complete a Post Graduate Certificate in Education (PGCE), which is traditionally a programme offered to fulltime ‘pre-service’ student teachers. However, part-time students have already been teaching in schools for some years and thus are in fact ‘in-service’ teachers. They have already gained professional practical knowledge through learning on-the-job. The study aimed to investigate what kind of knowledge they had learnt through experience and how this knowledge changes as a result of their formal learning on the PGCE. The study interviewed twenty part time PGCE students who are already practicing teachers about the kind of professional knowledge they acquired through the formal programme and their perceptions of how their practice changed as a result of this learning. Most of the respondents said that they had changed their teaching practice as a result of studying for the PGCE and that pedagogical knowledge about assessment, classroom management and lesson structuring strategies were deemed to be most important. More than half reported that the programme had developed their confidence as a result of both developing personal competence and through becoming a ‘real’ teacher by dint of achieving professional status. This points to the importance of offering teachers with a degree the opportunity to become professionally qualified through a flexibly offered programme.

Do We Produce Enough Mathematics and Science Teachers?

For years, we've been told that we don't produce enough math and science teachers. Increasing teacher retirements and increasing student enrollments, we're told, have forced many school systems to lower standards to fill teaching openings, leading to high levels of underqualified teachers and, in turn, to lower student performance. Numerous high-profile reports have directly tied mathematics and science teacher shortages to a host of education and social problems, including the inability to meet student achievement goals, low U.S. performance compared to other nations, the minority achievement gap, poor national economic competitiveness, and even threats to national security. The antidotes have been straightforward: Reformers, legislators, and school officials have implemented a wide range of initiatives designed to recruit able candidates into teaching and to increase the supply of qualified math and science teachers. But, after several decades, we seem to have made little progress. Why? Despite the long-standing prominence of this issue, there has been surprisingly little empirical research on math and science teacher supply, demand, and shortages. Although it has been widely assumed that student enrollments and teacher retirements have far outstripped the production of new math and science teachers, there do not appear to be any studies that test this claim with data. Several years ago, I set out to use the best national data available to answer these questions. Together with my research assistants, David Perda, Lisa Merrill, and Henry May, I analyzed two decades of data from several national surveys conducted by the U.S. Department of Education. I sought the answer to five questions: * What has happened to the demand and need for math and science teachers? * What are the main sources of new hires? * Has the new supply been sufficient to cover increases in student enrollments and increases in teacher retirements? * How many schools have trouble finding qualified candidates to fill their math and science job openings? and * Does the problem vary by state or locale? Many of our findings contradict conventional wisdom and, no doubt, will be viewed by some as heretical. It became clear that the reasons for these staffing problems are more complex and varied than simply an insufficient production of new teachers (Ingersoll and Perda 2010; Ingersoll and May 2010). THE DEMAND Beginning in the mid-1980s and continuing to the present, elementary and secondary student enrollments in the United States have grown steadily. Over the same period, high school graduation course requirements increased in the core academic subjects, especially in math and science. This led, in turn, to a dramatic rise in the number of students taking math and science courses over the past two decades. Math course enrollments grew by 69%, and science course enrollments grew by 60%. In addition, during this period, the number of teacher retirements increased by a striking 141%. All of these factors led to a large jump in the demand for new math and science teachers, and we would expect worsening shortages. THE SOURCES Unlike other nations, the United States produces new teachers through large numbers of accessible, widely dispersed teacher-preparation programs--an average of 25 per state--usually in departments or colleges of education. But, despite the large number of teacher-preparation programs, the traditional pipeline of college students with freshly completed education degrees is, surprisingly, a relatively minor source of new teachers. It constitutes less than a quarter of new math and science teacher hires in any given year. A larger source is those entering teaching with noneducation degrees in math or in one of the sciences, such as biology or chemistry. An even larger source of new hires is what is called the reserve pool, primarily former teachers who left teaching to return later (see Figure 1). …

Cooperative Learning Group for English Teachers: One Way of Supporting Under-qualified Teachers

The fact that English teachers in Indonesia especially in remote area are under qualified is not debatable/They are not only incapable of teaching well but quite a lot of them also still need help in their English proficiency. Asking them to take an English class for them is almost impossible. There must be ways of developing their professionalism while they are performing as teachers.Building a cooperative learning group for English teacher will make them improved in both the knowledge and skills in teaching because of the very slogan of cooperative learning, which is "sink and swim together". Each group will be responsible for the improvement of all members because their success is determined by the success of' the group and the group also determines the success of the individual. This movement will be much more effective if it is used as one of the criteria of kenaikan pangkat.

Teacher Labor Markets in Developed Countries

Helen Ladd takes a comparative look at policies that the world's industrialized countries are using to assure a supply of high-quality teachers. Her survey puts U.S. educational policies and practices into international perspective. Ladd begins by examining teacher salaries-an obvious, but costly, policy tool. She finds, perhaps surprisingly, that students in countries with high teacher salaries do not in general perform better on international tests than those in countries with lower salaries. Ladd does find, however, that the share of underqualified teachers in a country is closely related to salary. In high-salary countries like Germany, Japan, and Korea, for example, only 4 percent of teachers are underqualified, as against more than 10 percent in the United States, where teacher salaries, Ladd notes, are low relative to those in other industrialized countries. Teacher shortages also appear to stem from policies that make salaries uniform across academic subject areas and across geographic regions. Shortages are especially common in math and science, in large cities, and in rural areas. Among the policy strategies proposed to deal with such shortages is to pay teachers different salaries according to their subject area. Many countries are also experimenting with financial incentive packages, including bonuses and loans, for teachers in specific subjects or geographic areas. Ladd notes that many developed countries are trying to attract teachers by providing alternative routes into teaching, often through special programs in traditional teacher training institutions and through adult education or distance learning programs. To reduce attrition among new teachers, many developed countries have also been using formal induction or mentoring programs as a way to improve new teachers' chances of success. Ladd highlights the need to look beyond a single policy, such as higher salaries, in favor of broad packages that address teacher preparation and certification, working conditions, the challenges facing new teachers, and the distribution of teachers across geographic areas.

The effectiveness of mentoring in the Distance Teacher Education Programme at the Lesotho College of Education: student teachers' and tutors' perceptions

In response to the need for more qualified primary school teachers in Lesotho, the Lesotho College of Education (LCE) introduced the Distance Teacher Education Programme (DTEP), an in-service training programme for unqualified and underqualified teachers. As part of the curriculum in this programme, the more than 1 200 student teachers who were enrolled needed to be supported and mentored, but were served by only 16 tutors in six different regions. As one of the tutors and mentors in the DTEP, the researcher (LM-M) undertook a qualitative perception survey through focus group discussions with student teachers and tutors in the DTEP. The researcher was able to evaluate the mentoring system in the DTEP according to the functions of effective mentoring, as identified in a literature review. The strengths and weaknesses identified in the survey are highlighted and recommendations are made for different stakeholders on how the mentoring system can be improved.

The Problem of Underqualified Teachers: A Sociological Perspective

staffed by qualified teachers. Many states have pushed for more-rigorous preservice teacher education, training, and certification standards. Moreover, a host of recruitment initiatives have attempted to increase the supply of teachers: alternative licensing, midcareer change programs, financial incentives, and even overseas recruitment. The capstone of these efforts was the enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act

A Qualified teacher in every classroom?: appraising old answers and new ideas

A Qualified Teacher in Every Classroom? lays out new approaches for ensuring high-quality teacher preparation while offering a candid assessment of the obstacles that may impede the implementation of such new models. Under the No Child Left Behind Act, states will have to ensure that every public school classroom is staffed by a highly qualified teacher. This mandate--and the fact that many children, especially low-income and minority students, are taught by underqualified teachers ill-equipped for the challenges ahead--gives new urgency to debates over teacher recruitment, preparation, and induction. For several years, these debates have been dominated by competing groups of partisans. One denies that teaching requires a professional base of knowledge and skill, while the other tries to promote professionalism by ensuring that traditional programs retain their control over licensure and formal certification. The conflict confuses policymakers, frustrates educators, and stifles potentially promising solutions. In this volume, eleven contributors with rich experience in policy and teaching take a fresh look at a number of issues, including: Current systems for preparing and licensing teachers, and how they affect the quality and supply of teachers in the work force; An array of reform models for teacher preparation and licensure, and what they would mean for the profession; Questions of rigor and ideology in the core curricula of education schools or programs; The federal role in teacher preparation and licensure, especially in light of NCLB.

Why Some Schools Have More Underqualified Teachers Than Others

Why Some Schools Have More Underqualified Teachers Than Others

Introduction: Cultural Capital and African American Education

This Special Issue of The Journal of African American History examines the role of African Americans in providing financial and other material resources for the support of public and private schools established in black communities in the United States from the antebellum era to the 1960s. Over the last three decades there have been regular reports in books, magazines, and newspaper articles describing the precarious financial conditions for urban public school systems with a majority of African American and other nonwhite student populations. Urban public school systems are dependent upon state legislators and local politicians for their funding, and as these school systems became majority black, there has been a greater unwillingness to make sure that the educational expenditures are equalized for students in urban and suburban, rich and poor school districts. The failure of state and local judges and other officials to mandate the equalization of funding for urban and suburban public school districts has m eant that public school administrators in financially strapped urban school systems, many of whom are African Americans, have eliminated many academic programs, such as art, music, science, and math programs, and most extracurricular activities; have been unable to introduce the latest forms of educational technology into the classrooms, and have been forced to hire large numbers of uncertified and underqualified teachers. This has resulted in extremely high levels of academic failure, as measured by newly mandated standardized tests, and consistently high dropout rates, particularly among African Americans and other children of color in financially depressed urban public school systems. (1) The failure of state and local officials to provide equal or even adequate funding for all-black or predominantly black public schools is not a new development in the history of African American education in the United States. In the period from the end of the Civil War to the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 outlawing legal segregation in public education, white legislators in most of the southern states (and many northern states) also refused to utilize public expenditures to insure the equalization of funding for black and white public schooling. In fact, scholar and educator W. E. B. Du Bois, in the famous Atlanta University Studies devoted to The Negro Common School (1901) and The Common School and the Negro American (1911), pointed out that African Americans in most southern states were paying more in public taxation than they were receiving in state and local funding for separate black public schools. As a result of this situation, in the period from 1890 to 1910, southern b lack taxpayers were in effect providing the funds for the public schooling of white children. Southern white school officials consistently refused to supply adequate funding for black public education until they felt threatened by the possibility of court-mandated public school desegregation in the late 1940s and 1950s. (2) As a result of the discriminatory funding practices of white state officials, African American children throughout the country attended inadequately funded public schools from the Reconstruction era to the 1960s. Many times the resources needed for basic instruction, including blackboards, pencils, books, chairs, desks, even land and buildings, had to be supplied by members of the local black communities. In many instances, southern white public school officials were only willing to provide funds for the salary of the black elementary school teachers, who were paid much less than similarly qualified white teachers. Everything else needed for the instruction of black children had to be supplied by African Americans in the local black communities. In 1988 historian James D. Anderson in The Education of Blacks in the South, 1861-1935 pointed out that since the end of the Reconstruction era, black southerners had adapted to a structure of oppressive education by practicing double taxation. …

How Much of a Problem? A Reply to Ingersoll's "The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools"

How Much of a Problem? A Reply to Ingersoll's "The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools"

Research News And Comment: How Much of a Problem? A Reply to Ingersoll's "The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools"

Research News And Comment: How Much of a Problem? A Reply to Ingersoll's "The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools"

The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools

The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools

The Problem of Underqualified Teachers in American Secondary Schools

This article presents the results of a research project on the phenomenon of out-of-field teaching in American high schools–teachers teaching subjects for which they have little education or training. Over the past couple of years, the problem of out-of-field teaching has become a prominent topic in the realm of educational policy and reform, and the results of this research have been widely reported and commented on both by education policymakers and the national media. But unfortunately, out-of-field teaching is a problem that remains largely misunderstood. My research utilizes nationally representative data from the Schools and Staffing Survey, conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics. The purpose of this article is to summarize what my research has revealed about out-of-field teaching: how much of it goes on; to what extent it varies across different subjects, across different kinds of schools, and across different kinds of classrooms; and finally, the reasons for its prevalence in American schools. The data show that even using a minimal standard for qualified teachers — those holding a college minor in the fields in which they teach —the numbers of out-of-field teachers are striking. For example, a third of all secondary school teachers of mathematics have neither a major nor a minor in mathematics. My analyses have also shown that out-of-field teaching greatly varies across schools, teachers, and classrooms. The crucial question, however, and the source of great misunderstanding is why so many teachers are teaching subjects for which they have little background. 1 examine three widely believed explanations of out-of-field teaching — that out-of-field teaching is a result of either inadequate training on the part of teachers, inflexible teacher unions, or shortages of qualified teachers. My analysis shows that each of these views is seriously flawed. The article closes by offering an alternative explanation for out-of-field teaching—one focused on the organizational structure of schools and the occupational conditions and characteristics of teaching.