Urban Teacher Education Program Research Articles

Research as a Catalyst for Change

Throughout our editorship, we have emphasized the goal of bringing together the three dimensions of teacher education-practice, policy, and research--to address issues or challenges faced by stakeholders in the field (see Editorials 63:1 and 63:2). The theme of the upcoming 2014 American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE) Annual Meeting, Taking Charge of Change, provides an opportunity to highlight the role of research to impact policy and practice within five strands: Owning School Performance; Creating Innovative and Culturally Relevant Pedagogy; Evidence of Impact--State of the Art; and Implementing Change that Works. Journal of Teacher Education (JTE) has published a number of articles that advance our understanding in these strands and welcomes additional studies that contribute to our ability to describe, implement, and assess innovative practices that lead to change in preservice and inservice teacher education. The current issue reflects our emphasis on the integration of research, practice, and policy in teacher education with several studies that contribute to knowledge about innovative practices and have the potential to provide the evidence for change in teacher preservice and inservice professional development. Highlights of the Current Issue The articles that comprise this issue represent the diversity that characterizes the JTE readership. Topics include video-case analysis, mentoring of novice teachers, preservice teachers' responses to cyber bullying, preparation of teachers for urban settings, recruitment of special education teachers, and professional development in online settings. All have well-developed implications for policy, practice, and research. The contexts are varied with focus on international, national, and local settings. Both quantitative and qualitative methodologies are represented, including studies using mixed methods. In the first article--Formal and Informal Mentoring: Complementary, Compensatory, or Consistent?--Desimone, Hochberg, Porter, Polikoff, Schwartz, and Johnson investigate the roles of mentors in the learning of 57 novice middle school math teachers in 11 school districts. They extend the study of mentoring of novice teachers to include informal as well as formal mentors. The authors explore differences between the characteristics of the two types and their respective interactions with mentees, discussing how manipulable policy variables shape these interactions. Findings indicate that being in the same school with time set aside to meet was related to more time being spent with both types of mentors. Beginning teachers reported spending more time with their formal mentors if they were experiencing challenging classes or if their mentors had math teaching experience. The two types of mentors serve complementary roles, with informal mentors addressing more personal needs and formal mentors addressing professional needs. Arya, Christ, and Chiu, Facilitation and Teacher Behaviors: An Analysis of Literacy Teachers' Video-Case Discussions, investigate the relationship between peer and professor facilitation and teacher behavior during video-case discussions. The researchers extended research in this area through their use of Statistical Discourse Analysis, an approach that addresses many of the problems inherent in other methodological approaches to analyzing discourse. Findings depict multistep facilitation processes that occurred in professor-teacher and teacher-teacher discussions and provide implications for facilitating teachers' critical thinking, connection-making, and determination of instructional challenges during discussions. The third article, Unpacking the 'Urban' in Urban Teacher Education, by Kavita Matsko and Karen Hammerness, provides an argument for context-specific teacher preparation rather than preparation for generic settings as is typically the case. The authors conducted a descriptive, theory-building study of the University of Chicago Urban Teacher Education Program to examine how features of the urban context were addressed at this site. …

Unpacking the “Urban” in Urban Teacher Education

The literature on preparing teachers for urban schools provides a rationale for helping candidates understand the particular cultures of students. However, research has not sufficiently “unpacked” features of the setting that programs can address; nor has it discussed how programs tailor teaching approaches to their specific contexts. Drawing from program descriptions, syllabi, and interviews, we describe the “context-specific” approach of the University of Chicago Urban Teacher Education Program that prepares teachers for Chicago Public Schools and ways that it helps candidates make meaning of that setting. We present a framework to show how the program defines and then teaches as content essential knowledge about a district and its children—including community and neighborhood histories, district curricula, and policies—that must inform teaching and learning. We include examples of context-specific teacher preparation that illustrate how candidates learn about particularities of Chicago Public Schools and apply this knowledge to develop context-specific understandings and practices.

Unpacking internalized racism: teachers of color striving for racially just classrooms

Within racial inequitable educational conditions, students of color in US schools are susceptible to internalizing racism. If these students go on to be teachers, the consequences can be particularly detrimental if internalized racism influences their teaching. Framed in Critical Race Theory, this article investigates the process pre-service teachers of color took in unpacking their internalized racism as they strive for racially just classrooms. In-depth interviews and focus groups were conducted with black (four) Latina (four) and Asian American (four) women enrolled in a social justice-oriented urban teacher education program in California. Data revealed that participants in this study: (1) had experienced racism and internalized racism in their K-12 education; (2) had done self-work prior to enrolling in their teacher education program to begin the process of unpacking internalized racism; and (3) felt that critical dialogues about internalized racism within teacher preparation was essential to develop pedagogy that challenges racial inequality. This study adds to the field by taking a cross-racial approach to understanding the struggles of teachers of color with internalized racism in their own lives. It additionally outlines an important process many teachers of color go through to develop racially just classrooms.

Teachers as Civic Agents

Under the guise of increasing quality and accountability, many urban teacher education programs and professional development models characterize educators as mere transmitters of standardized content knowledge. The authors argue that such dehumanizing practices, which are rooted in the discourse of neoliberalism, prevent teachers from helping their students develop powerful literacies and civic skills. The authors seek to disrupt mainstream views about teaching and learning by instead envisioning the “Teacher as Civic Agent.” By reevaluating theories of schooling and democracy and analyzing a particular learning community that conceptualizes teachers as public intellectuals, this work aims to make an important theoretical shift in how educators, politicians, and policy makers think about the purpose of education in a democracy. The authors argue for new paradigm of teacher education in which teachers engage with local communities, become producers of knowledge, and work collectively in solidarity with their students to create social change.

A Programmatic View of Portfolios for Urban Teacher Preparation

This replication study represents an analysis of 47 exit portfolios of students enrolled in an urban teacher education program. Portfolios were analyzed to determine the degree to which students integrated concepts related to teaching in urban schools: asset/deficit perspectives, connections with families, social justice, high expectations for student learning, and contextualized teaching and learning. The portfolios fall into three groups along a continuum from “awareness” to “trying things out” to “making it their own.” With 30%, 51%, and 19% falling into each group respectively, the data are interpreted in relationship to faculty development and the challenges of scaffolding preservice teachers.

Opportunities to Teach and Learn in High-Needs Schools: Student Teachers’ Experiences in Urban Placements

This article presents findings from a qualitative study of student teachers' opportunities to learn in and for urban, high-needs schools. The analysis builds on Darling-Hammond and Bransford’s knowledge base for teaching framework to examine the role of student teaching in preparing teachers as equity-minded adaptive experts, equipped to work with diverse students in urban, high-needs schools. The study focuses on the experiences and perspectives of six preservice elementary teachers across two specialized urban teacher education programs. Findings demonstrate how placement features—in particular, cooperating teachers’ classroom-based instantiations of the external policy context—enabled and/or constrained opportunities for preservice teacher learning. Implications focus on new directions for research and practice in specialized teacher education. In conclusion, the authors call for closer investigation of what and how preservice teachers learn in and through student teaching.

“The Hardest Thing to Turn From”: The Effects of Service-Learning on Preparing Urban Educators

In this article, the author describes her use of service-learning as a pedagogical strategy for developing preservice students' dispositions for urban teaching. Twenty-one students were enrolled in a multicultural education course with a service-learning requirement. This was the students' first teacher education course in a two-year, urban-focused strand of the university's larger teacher education program. Students engaged in tutoring in local urban elementary and high schools. They also conducted observations, interviews, and worked in a community center. The author describes how the action-reflection process differed for students from urban home and schooling backgrounds and those from suburban home and schooling backgrounds. She posits that the service-learning experience facilitated the reflection process in students that led them to be more social justice-oriented in their thoughts about urban teaching. The author also argues that the experience enhanced their commitment to and motivations for urban teaching. Of particular focus is the effect the service-learning had on preservice students of color who were the racial majority in this cohort. The author also discusses some of the challenges faced as a teacher educator attempting to be more holistic in her teaching through the use of service-learning and implications for urban teacher education courses and program design.

Transformation in Reverse

The complexity of urban contexts is often subsumed into generalizations and deficit assumptions of urban communities and its members by those unfamiliar with urban culture. This is especially true for teachers seeking work in urban schools. This article addresses the complex interpretations of urban through the lens of a White male graduate student teacher, Nathan, as he contemplates his experiences in urban school settings. The trajectory of his understanding of the complex nature of urban realities that influence the work of urban teachers and the lives of their students is discussed. The article concludes with implications for urban teacher education programs and teacher educators.

Biography, Identity, and Inquiry: The making of teacher, teacher educator, and researcher

This is a self-study of my professional and cultural biography and identity, a history which directed me first toward the work of urban teaching and then into teacher education and research into comparative educational issues of racial and national identity. I use this inquiry to demonstrate how biography and identity influences the lived experience of teaching and the researcher's stance. I also examine areas where preservice urban teacher education programs must improve. My personal recommendations describe experiences that would have better prepared me for urban teaching. Suggestions include expanding coursework in the historical, political, and sociocultural influences on urban education and in designing culturally responsive curricula. I also recommend restructuring field experiences to offer richer classroom-based learning opportunities for preservice teachers and extending fieldwork into urban communities. Finally, I suggest ongoing inservice teacher education in learning-community models that respond to educators' context-specific teaching concerns.

Merging General and Special Education Teacher Preparation Programs to Create an Inclusive Program for Diverse Learners

This article describes a number of internal organizational initiatives within an urban teacher education program designed to foster inclusive, responsive practices by newly licensed general and special education teacher candidates. After implementing a merged preparation program for both special and general educators, we captured faculty and student perspectives.

The Graduate Writing Challenge: A Perspective from an Urban Teacher Education Program

This article addresses the debate on college literacy achievement by focusing on teacher education students. In addition to acquiring the academic tools for teaching, many of those students might need to remediate their literacy gaps while mastering graduate-level academic writing skills. This study inquired into variables that might help predict students' writing performance and thus inform program development. A quantitative strand examined the relationship between undergraduate grade point average, ranking of undergraduate institution attended, educational attainment of the parents, and actual writing performance as measured by the grade assigned to a prompt. A qualitative strand inquired into students' beliefs about their writing skills, comparing those to the outcomes of the prompt. Findings indicated that grade point average and ranking of the undergraduate institution attended can be significant predictors of writing performance but that students' beliefs about their own writing did not forecast actual writing performance.

Redesigning an "Urban" Teacher Education Program: An Activity Theory Perspective

In this article, we use activity theory to frame the redesign of an urban teacher education program. Some of the contradictions that we had to deal with are endemic to traditional teacher education programs while others were particular to this program, which has as its goal to prepare teachers to work in urban (inner-city) schools. Our intervention consisted of a change to coteaching, a collective form of teaching, and cogenerative dialoguing, a process of creating local theory involving coteachers and student representatives. Our coteaching/cogenerative-dialoguing paradigm makes salient the social, collective, rather than individual, psychological dimensions of learning to teach. Because of the redesign process, new forms of relations between new teachers, cooperating (in-service) teachers, and supervisors emerged that are more participatory and democratic than they had been in the past.

Pre-Professional Skills Test Scores as College of Education Admission Criteria

The authors examined aspects of concurrent, predictive, and consequential validity evidence of the Pre-Professional Skills Test (PPST) scores as college of education admission criteria. American College Test (ACT) scores and PPST subtest scores of 372 graduates, and PPST scores, undergraduate grade point averages (GPAs), and student-teaching ratings of 1,062 graduates of a southwestern urban teacher education program were investigated. Findings of correlation and hierarchical regression analyses suggest evidence of a concurrent relationship between corresponding PPST and ACT subtest scores, no predictive relationship between PPST scores and student-teaching ratings, and a weak predictive relationship between PPST scores and student undergraduate GPAs. In addition, a differential impact of the use of the PPST on ethnic minorities was apparent. The plausibility of waiving PPST requirements for applicants with above-average ACT subtest scores is discussed.

Disengaging from the Legacy of Lady Bountiful in Teacher Education Classrooms

Working specifically from the authors location in a working class urban teacher education program in the United States, this paper argues for the examination and problematization of one foundational archetype of a teacher in North America: the (white) Lady Bountiful. Incorporating discussions of the historical colonial contexts that produced this archetype and the ideologies she represents, this paper argues that the persistence of this image in popular culture, in teacher education programs, and beyond, contributes to a climate that makes it difficult to address white supremacy, heteronormativity and social class issues in teacher education programs. In addition, the endurance of this archetype can 'prohibit' certain bodies from entering the teaching profession.

Inequity as a Source of the Cultural Gap in an Urban School-University Collaborative

Based on a 5-year naturalistic evaluation of an urban university-school collaborative that focused on preparing teachers for urban schools, this analysis was initiated to determine to what extent inequalities between the university and school personnel mitigated the attainment of intended outcomes. Results indicated that some positive change occurred, such as professors and teachers learning to speak the same language on instructional teams, which led to improved field experiences for students. However, cultural differences with concomitant inequities between school and university personnel prevented more permanent change. Inequities of power were inadvertently written into the proposal and were exacerbated at two levels: (1) the collaborative policy board, in which districts, due to larger representation, wielded greater power over budget and hiring in the collaborative; and (2) instructional teams where professors wielded power over several teachers with resistance from teachers. By the end of 5 years, the funded portion of the urban teacher education program that included a collaborative policy board and instructional teams had fallen mostly by the wayside. Cooperation between professors and teachers reverted to precollaborative levels with only loose coupling remaining. Preservice students continue to do field experiences in the professional development schools under supervision. The university education unit recognized the benefits, but continues to struggle with how to revive the level of cooperation that began with the urban program and to create long term partnerships that go beyond mere placement of students into the field.

An Innovative Strategy Supports Student Teachers in Urban Secondary Schools

ost of the urban teacher education programs that existed during the past thirty-five years are now defunct. Even those considered very successful-such as the Urban Teacher Corps, the Cooperative Urban Teacher Education (CUTE) programs of the Mid-Continent Regional Education Lab, Indiana University's Urban Project, and the West Dallas Teacher Education Program at the University of North Texas-no longer exist. Because of the demise of urban teacher training programs, current teacher education programs must serve as a preparation for urban teachers. However, according to the Association of Teacher Educators, generic programs are inadequate as a preparation for urban teachers (Buttery, Haberman, and Houston 1990). Martin Haberman (1987), who has researched and written extensively on the preparation of teachers for urban schools and effective urban teaching, considers them (traditional, campus-based teacher education programs) a waste of time. According to Haberman (1987), the average career of an urban teacher is between three and five years, and in every five-year period approximately one-half of the urban teaching force leaves the profession. As a result, there is a teacher shortage in the nation's 120 largest urban school districts (Haberman 1987). The lack of specific urban teacher education programs and the inadequacy of current teacher education programs as a preparation for urban teachers have contributed to the high rate of urban teacher attrition. Because of an urban teacher shortage, many newly certified teachers, who want to teach immediately after becoming licensed, will begin their careers in large, inner-city schools. Many of those novice teachers, who lack adequate urban teacher preparation, may be overwhelmed by the problems associated with urban teaching. The problems they will face, such as students' antagonism toward school, their lack of respect for themselves and their teachers, poor student discipline, high rates of student absenteeism, stu-

Professional conversations: new teachers explore teaching through conversation, story, and narrative

Undergraduate students and recent graduates of an urban teacher education program came together regularly to talk about becoming reflective and effective teachers. Qualitative analysis of the conversations produced a rich picture of the complex learning at the heart of teaching. The study draws attention to factors in teacher education and schools that support and hinder new teachers’ work in urban schools, and contradicts established developmental models of expertise. Additionally, the study highlights the potential of conversation and story telling to sustain teacher learning and inquiry and to meet local needs for teacher learning, teacher research, and teacher-directed professional development.

Mentoring with Future Urban Teachers

Increasing educational opportunities for children who live in urban areas is a social, moral, and economic imperative. Teacher preparation is one key to facing this challenge, and mentoring appears to hold promise as a critical component of urban teacher education programs. This article summarizes the mentoring component of a large, federally funded partnership project designed to support future urban teachers. Procedures for recruiting and selecting mentor teachers, typical mentor-student activities, and participants' perceptions of the mentoring activities are described.

A Collaborative Field-Based Urban Teacher Education Program

A Collaborative Field-Based Urban Teacher Education Program

Trainees' Perceptions of Types of Instructional Practices Modeled in an Urban Teacher Education Program

The need for teachers who are prepared to work with the increasingly diverse population of special education students in urban areas has become critical. Accordingly, teacher educators must seek to improve the effectiveness of their programs. Urban trainees will need to be competent in a wide range of research-based instructional practices, and teacher educators can introduce these practices to trainees by modeling them in teacher education courses. In order to investigate current practice, this study examined urban trainees' (N=249) perceptions of the frequency and importance of teaching methods modeled in their professional training. The results of a survey suggested that little variety of instructional practices was erycployed and that trainees tended to value most those approaches most frequently used. The expansion of research and training efforts in this area is recommended.