Last summer, New York City Schools Chancellor Harold Levy appealed to the moral consciences of doctors, lawyers, and assorted professionals and persuaded hundreds to abandon boardrooms and operating rooms to jump into city classrooms as teachers. (Peyser, 2000, p. 40)Members of New York City's professional caste dutifully answered the call, including [Franklin] Headley, who spent the last few years pursuing a Ph.D. in history at Columbia University. Mr. Headley dropped what he was doing last summer to join the New York City Teaching Fellows, a new program that gives novices a crash course in teaching and promptly dispatches them to the city's lowest-performing schools. Chancellor Levy warned that their task would be arduous, and sure enough, 53 of the 349 people selected as teaching fellows have already quit. Most of the people who dropped out did so because they were overwhelmed with classroom discipline problems or felt they were not sufficiently prepared to teach in such troubled environments. (Goodnough, 2000, p. B9)
So reported New York journalists in their ongoing reports concerning New York City's efforts to recruit nontraditional teaching candidates through shortcut, alternative routes into the profession. Such news reports, as well as the research literature, raise a number of questions about the current rush to create alternative routes into teaching: What kinds of knowledge do candidates need before they begin teaching? Do alternative licensure programs attract high-quality teachers to the field? Do alternatively certified teachers produce higher student achievement gains? Will alternative preparation programs produce teachers who will stay in teaching? We know that the answers to these questions suggest that many alternative routes into teaching don't produce good teachers, yet alternative preparation policies and practices proliferate.
An Alternative Certification Overview
With teacher shortages growing, alternative routes into teaching have been an increasingly attractive strategy for U.S. policymakers, who also continue to question the effectiveness of traditional teacher education. In fact, 41 states now have some type of alternative that replaces the need for prospective teachers to go back to college for a major in education. Fourteen states have passed new legislation concerning alternative teaching routes during the last two years. Two-thirds of the 1,354 colleges and universities that prepare teachers have at least one graduate teaching program for midcareer professionals.
In 1998–1999, more than 24,000 teachers were certified through alternative routes in the 28 states that kept these data. Researchers estimate that more than 80,000 teachers have entered teaching by way of a nontraditional route during the past decade. Some states now generate a large percentage of their new teachers from alternative route programs. California prepares about 18 percent of new teachers through alternative routes, and Texas and New Jersey prepare 16 and 22 percent respectively (Feistritzer, 2000).
Across the country, and even within a single state, however, alternative teacher licensure programs—like traditional programs—cannot all be viewed as equal in terms of content, duration, rigor, and support for learning how to teach. Nontraditional programs range from graduate-level teacher education programs that use different and more responsive delivery models, to short-term alternative licensure programs that reduce the requirements for earning a state license, to traditional emergency hiring practices that fill vacancies by letting virtually anyone teach.
In the truncated shortcut programs, teacher candidates often get four to eight weeks of training in classroom management, simplified instruction on developing lessons plans, and an introduction to the complex world of teaching. Graduates of these programs are then thrust into classrooms as fully independent teachers, often in the most challenging classrooms filled with the most disadvantaged learners. In too many of these programs, mentors are not available. The education courses that these novice teachers take at night and on weekends often are not connected to their practice and add to their already heavy teaching burdens. No wonder that 15 percent of New York's alternative recruits quit just two months into the school year.
We need more alternative preparation and licensure programs to attract midcareer recruits into teaching—but they must be good programs. New recruits can work in classrooms, but they cannot work alone. Good programs have tightly supervised internships in the classrooms of expert teachers and offer corresponding coursework in teaching and assessment strategies and in child and adolescent psychology. Effective teachers need to know more than subject matter. Teachers must know how to connect with today's students—many of whom face a wide range of challenges, including dysfunctional families, a complex and morally ambiguous culture, and a boring school curriculum out of sync with their high-tech learning styles (Hersch, 1998).
To be fair, many traditional teacher education programs also do not address the kinds of knowledge and skills demanded by teaching today. But because of their limited content, duration, and rigor, many more alternative licensure programs inherently devalue those kinds of knowledge and needs. Most do not stand up to even the most modest standards. For example, the National Center for Education has identified only 12 of the 41 states that offer alternative licensure as having at least one exemplary program. And even those identified as exemplary programs are of questionable quality. For example, some of the programs require mentors, but not necessarily trained ones. And although they offer some professional education before entering teaching, there are no specifications regarding what candidates should know about teaching before entering their own classrooms. This finding is striking because a number of states—Texas, for example—have as many as 27 different alternative licensure programs (Feistritzer, 2000).
Equally disturbing is the paucity of data collected on these programs and their recruits. Twenty-seven of the 41 states do not collect demographic data on their alternatively prepared recruits, and 23 states do not systematically count the numbers of recruits who applied, were accepted, and enrolled in these programs. Only 10 states estimate the program costs, which range from $600 to $5,000 for training each recruit (Feistritzer, 2000).
Debunking the Myths
Despite these facts, there seems to be a proliferation of quick-fix, shortcut alternative licensure and preparation programs. Why? At least four myths promote the kind of thinking and action that lead to such programs. These myths are dangerous because they promote teacher preparation that will systematically harm our students, especially the most vulnerable ones.
Myth 1: Teachers need only a knowledge of subject matter, so shortcut alternative preparation programs can adequately ready teachers for teaching. No evidence suggests that possessing content knowledge is sufficient for effective teaching. Studies show that knowledge both of subject matter and of teaching and learning acquired in teacher education is strongly correlated with teacher performance in the classroom (Guyton & Farokhi, 1987). Teacher education coursework is sometimes more influential than additional subject matter preparation in promoting students' mathematics and science achievement (Monk & King, 1994). Studies indicate that new teachers have fewer of the typical novice teacher problems, such as problems with classroom management and organizing and sequencing lessons, when they have had more preparation. The better-prepared teachers are also able to use teaching strategies that respond to students' needs and learning styles and that encourage higher-order learning (Adams, Hutchinson, & Martray, 1980; Glassberg, 1980; Taylor & Dale, 1971).
In addition, although content knowledge is crucial, knowledge obtained from professional experience and an academic major is disconnected from the kinds of knowledge prospective teachers need to help their students reach K–12 standards. Many midcareer recruits lack the wide range of knowledge and skills that research has identified as necessary for effective teaching: understanding subject matter in ways that allow them to organize it and make it accessible to students; understanding how students think and behave, what they find interesting, what they already know, and how to motivate them; recognizing student differences that may arise from culture, language, family background, and prior schooling; and adapting lessons on the basis of that understanding. Engineers-turned-teachers may know a great deal about math, but their preparation and work experience in no way ensures that they have mastered these essential teaching skills.
Myth 2: Alternative licensure attracts high-quality teachers to the field. States collect very little data on this issue, but a national study of more than 14,000 teachers revealed that alternatively certified teachers had lower levels of educational accomplishment and higher levels of out-of-field teaching assignments (Shen, 1997). Some studies show that alternative route teachers have grade point averages that meet or surpass national averages of traditionally certified teachers, but other studies show that alternative licensure recruits in mathematics and science have lower grade point averages than their traditionally prepared counterparts and that they were reported to enter teaching because jobs were available, not because of an interest in teaching children (Stoddart, 1990).
The good news is that many alternative programs are attracting a more diverse teaching force. Nevertheless, the research is ambiguous on how well these teachers perform and is insufficient to conclude that alternative licensure paves the way for well-educated adults to enter teaching.
Myth 3: Alternative licensure produces more effective teachers who, in turn, produce higher student achievement. One controlled study found that students of traditionally prepared teachers had higher achievement gains in language arts than students of teachers who received just a few weeks of summer training from the district before they assumed full teaching responsibilities (Gomez & Grobe, 1990). Still, the research base on this issue offers far too little empirical evidence to use in crafting policy strategies. A recent review of the impact of alternative licensure found only 14 studies that shed light on important outcomes, and only half of those studies involved comparisons between alternatively certified teachers in a specific alternative route and graduates of traditional teacher preparation programs (S. Wilson, personal communication, December 22, 2000). In addition, the literature rarely includes content descriptions, making it difficult to ascertain real differences between alternative and traditional approaches. In some cases, alternative licensure may appear to be just as effective because the program is nothing more than traditional teacher education rendered differently or provided on an altered time line.
Some research supporting the claims that alternative licensure produces more effective teachers is very misleading. For example, one or two studies show that alternatively certified teachers are doing as well as other teachers on measures of student achievement. Other studies show discrepant findings and have serious methodological problems: for example, comparing a group of first-year, traditionally trained teachers with alternatively trained teachers with up to seven years of experience and comparing student outcomes from the two groups of teachers without controlling for student pretest scores (L. Darling-Hammond, personal communication, March 16, 2001).
Other misleading evidence has come from a recent longitudinal study claiming that mathematics and science students who have teachers with emergency licensure do no worse than students whose teachers have standard teaching credentials. The sample size of emergency-certified teachers was small, however, and 24 percent of the emergency-certified math and 32 percent of the emergency-certified science teachers actually had bachelor's degrees in education. Twenty-nine percent of both groups had master's degrees in education (Darling-Hammond, Berry, & Thoreson, in press).
Myth 4: Shortcut alternative preparation programs are just as likely to recruit teachers who will stay in teaching. Nothing could be further from the truth. In a recent analysis, about 60 percent of individuals who enter teaching through shortcut programs leave the profession by their third year, compared to about 30 percent of traditionally trained teachers and only about 10 to 15 percent of teachers prepared in extended five-year teacher education programs. In fact, the five-year program costs are considerably less than those of preparing a greater number of teachers in short-term programs who are less likely to stay and who may be less effective (Darling-Hammond, 1999).
High-Quality Alternative Routes
Dispelling these myths does not mean that we should not create high-quality alternative preparation programs for more mature, midcareer entrants into teaching. In fact, we should encourage such programs, building on the success of promising practices in the field. We know how to create high-quality alternatives to teacher preparation; many excellent programs that have been launched across the United States for recruiting and retaining well-prepared alternative route teachers show the way. Such programs include Bank Street College's fifth-year master's degree program, Colorado State University's Project Promise, and George Washington University's secondary education internship program (National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, 1996).
- Strong academic and pedagogical coursework that provides teachers with the subject matter and teaching knowledge needed to help students reach the state's curriculum teaching standards;
- Intensive field experience in the form of an internship or student teaching under the direct daily supervision of an expert teacher;
- A requirement that candidates meet all of the state's standards for subject matter and teaching knowledge for a standard certificate before becoming a teacher of record; and,
- A guarantee that new teachers meet all of the state's teacher quality standards, including passing the same assessments given to their traditionally prepared counterparts.
Alternative preparation programs must meet the same principles for quality that are applied to traditional programs. The National Commission on Teaching and America's Future studied exemplary teacher education programs and found them to be grounded in substantial knowledge of child and adolescent development, while recognizing that different subjects require different teaching and learning strategies. These programs have extended clinical experiences—at least 30 weeks in real classrooms—that are carefully chosen to support the ideas and practices presented in simultaneous, closely related college coursework. These programs rely on the extensive use of problem-based learning, case study methods, teacher research, and performance assessments to ensure that what the participants are learning applies to the real work of classroom teachers.
One way to fold these principles into a fast-track, one-year program would be to fund alternative route candidate positions at a higher cost ratio to offer scholarships for talented and committed candidates, to provide intensive pre-service training, and to offer a paid internship that allows for supervised teaching. Another alternative would be to allocate the equivalent of a full-time salary for the interns, but pay them at half the salary of a first-year teacher and use the remaining dollars for mentoring and academic support. Yet another alternative would be to give the interns full pay and allocate an additional half-time teaching position for each alternative route recruit. The additional investments would pay for recruitment incentives, tuition for academic coursework, mentor support, and team teaching during the internship year. To attract and retain the talented candidates needed in today's classrooms, the additional investments will be worth the expense.
Shortcut programs are often run in such a way that many of the less-prepared new recruits continue to be assigned to underresourced schools with socioeconomically disadvantaged students. Yet those schools need teachers with the most sophisticated repertoire of strategies to help their students meet higher academic standards. Growing evidence suggests that the districts and states that have the fewest underqualified teachers are more likely to have the highest achievement for all students—and vice versa. National studies have shown that students of color and poverty are the most likely to get underqualified teachers. State studies—including those in California and Texas—are showing the same disturbing trends (Darling-Hammond, 1997; E. Fuller, personal communication, February 2000; National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, 1996; Shields, Esch, Humphrey, Riehl, Tiffany-Morales, & Young, 2000).
Those who promote substandard teacher education preparation and licensure are either not willing to pay for the expense of better preparing teachers or are against educating all students equitably. We must draw the line and insist that there are no shortcuts for doing what matters most for all our students.
