School districts in the United States need thousands of new teachers each year. In elementary schools, mandates for reducing class size have created a widespread demand for teachers, particularly in urban schools that serve students from families below the poverty line. By 2005, teacher retirements will create many more teaching vacancies.
Meanwhile, thousands of qualified teachers simply choose not to teach or leave teaching after one or two years of working under difficult and stressful conditions. Teaching in urban schools is hard. Supplies and resources are inadequate, and many good principals are leaving. Finding competent individuals to fill teacher and school-leadership positions is becoming more challenging at all grade levels.
During the past decade, school districts have averted teacher shortages by awarding temporary contracts to new, uncertified teachers. Hoping to attract and retain enthusiastic and hardworking individuals, district human resources directors give temporary contracts to college graduates who pass basic tests in reading, writing, and mathematics before they assume their teaching positions. Every year, big-city school districts must recruit hundreds of new teachers, support them as they adjust to working with diverse groups of students, and work with universities to help these new teachers get their teaching credentials by completing the required coursework and assessments.
Some of these new emergency teachers have wanted to be teachers for a long time. They have worked with children as camp counselors, recreation leaders, tutors, teacher's aides, and teachers in religious schools. Their bachelor's degrees are from state-approved liberal arts programs. They teach full time, with the understanding that they will earn credentials by completing professional teaching classes at night.
Many others, however, are entering teaching from other professions or with degrees in such fields as business or psychology. Because their degree requirements did not include coursework in subjects typical of elementary schools—history, math, science, the arts, physical education, English language arts, and human development—these candidates must prove their understanding through standardized tests.
In California, where thousands of teaching vacancies will open during the coming years, all aspiring elementary school teachers must pass the Multiple Subjects Assessment for Teachers (MSAT), one of the Praxis II tests from the Educational Testing Service. This test has high stakes. It isn't that teachers who have not taken the MSAT don't get jobs. They do. Districts can hire them as long as they agree to participate in appropriate workshops and prepare to take the test. Teachers cannot keep their jobs, however, if they do not eventually pass the test, and they cannot finish university preparation programs until they achieve the designated scores. Novice teachers must jump this important hurdle at the same time that they are working long days, learning new skills, and adapting to stressful circumstances in problem-ridden schools.
One New Teacher
"I can see in color again!" exclaimed the 30-year-old woman who had just received a passing score on her third try at the MSAT. For the past year, her world had seemed bleak as she struggled to pass. Despite her reputation as a good teacher, her self-esteem had slipped to a lifetime low and her anxiety had grown. She recalled: When other teachers in the teachers' lounge talked about passing and how it really wasn't such a bad test, I just kept quiet. I have always been a good student. My report cards were always good, but my test scores were always just so-so. I have always been nervous about testing situations. My students' parents tell me that I am a wonderful teacher for their children. My principal's evaluations have said that I do exemplary work. I passed the test on how to teach reading the first time, but I just haven't been able to beat this other one until now. I have spent hundreds of dollars on test fees and preparation courses and hundreds of hours studying facts that don't apply to my teaching situation.
Like so many other teachers, she had been wrapped up in serving her students. Teaching kindergarten had not afforded her opportunities to review advanced algebra or solid geometry, and she had not thought about metaphors or onomatopoeia for years. Until her weekends of intensive study, she had not learned about historical events of the 11th century since high school.
Many of her colleagues are in a similar situation. Of the 16 kindergarten teachers in her elementary school, 12 are new teachers on emergency permits, and 10 of them must pass the MSAT before they can take the courses in methods, theory, and supervision that they need for their teaching credentials. Like so many teachers who teach in the primary grades or who teach special education classes, the questions on the standardized test do not cover what they teach. In contrast, their colleagues in middle schools discover that the longer they teach, the better chance they have to pass the test.
The Testing Experience
It is Saturday at the university. With pencils and calculators in hand, hundreds of adults from their early 20s through their 50s arrive at the campus. Some are here for the first time, some have been here several times, and a few are here for the sixth, seventh, or eighth time.
They sign in and file into classrooms, where monitors assign them to sit silently in designated rows of seats. After listening to the testing rules, the candidates receive the signal to break the test booklet seals and begin. After two hours of filling in bubbles to answer multiple choice questions, they hear the signal sound again. During the break, the atmosphere is tense. The test content is rigorous, typical of the material covered in advanced classes at good high schools. The test takers may not discuss the specific content of the test, but some grumble. Then they return to their desks for three hours of essay writing. Many individuals report falling asleep as soon as they get home after their exhausting day.
Who Passes?
A young woman who came to teach in California after being recruited from a prestigious midwestern university found the test an interesting challenge. The overview of the multiple subjects matched what she had learned throughout her life. She saw the test as merely a small hurdle that she needed to jump over—and she did. Individuals who have always been good students and test takers and have had courses and experiences in a wide range of fields usually pass on the first attempt. They review one of the test-prep books and that's that.
Teachers of upper grades who spend time studying the subjects that are on the test in order to teach them also pass easily, especially if they teach challenging classes for capable students. Other individuals who tend to pass are those who can afford to devote months to systematic study and coursework.
Who Doesn't Pass?
Another young woman taught 2nd grade for two years in a school that served diverse students who were bused in from a variety of neighborhoods. She had grown up in a working-class community and did well enough in school to go to a community college and finish at the state university. Unlike novices in some other situations, she was one of only two new emergency teachers at her school, and she had the daily support of a nearby practicing teacher. She grew and flourished, learning a great deal about the local community for social studies and about animals for science lessons. She found that her interest in children's literature served her well and helped her create a well-stocked classroom library.
Her students scored well on tests. She managed her classroom well and handled student discipline in a positive manner. Her boyfriend came to work with her on weekends to create classroom furniture and arrange a warm classroom environment. But she no longer teaches. After many tries, she could not pass the test within the five-year deadline, so her district, attentive to state rules, let her go. She now works in an office.
Some individuals don't perform well on standardized tests. New teachers whose own education has been satisfactory, but not excellent, don't have the full background of content knowledge at their fingertips. Teachers whose language background is not English have difficulty passing the test. And, of course, those who do not have the time to study thoroughly are not successful.
Many emergency teachers can succeed at teaching despite their inability to pass the MSAT. Principals and colleagues report that these new teachers prepare interesting lessons for their students. Many are the first in their families to graduate from college. They fulfill the roles played by effective teachers: facilitators, diagnosticians, communicators, organizers, models, explainers, evaluators, learners, coordinators, and managers (Tompkins, 1997).
Quality Assessment?
The current wisdom about education practice for elementary students tells us that we are wise to depend on multiple types of measures. We know that instruction needs appropriate assessments and that we should consider standardized testing as only one of many important tools. Evaluation is "not by tests alone" (Scherer, 2000). Just as we know to watch our students carefully as they perform authentic tasks, so can we more closely observe new teachers.
Unfortunately, we are inconsistent about what we know is effective for our elementary students and what we demand of the adults who serve those students. The tests do not align with the functions of more than half of our elementary classroom teachers. Policymakers need to support the use of alternative means for teachers to demonstrate that they are knowledgeable about the content they must teach.
What We Should Do
We can take some steps to assess prospective teachers more fairly.
Practice what we preach. Guides to the practice of quality assessment always remind us that we should look beneath and beyond standardized test scores. We can keep high standards while we use multiple measures to evaluate teacher candidates. Excellence on four out of five measures, for example, is possible and reasonable.
Use authentic measures. Videos and audiotapes of teaching, student responses in content areas, visits by independent assessors, complex portfolios that include reflection and subject matter components, and written assessments by peers and principals can lend insight into the knowledge and performance of individuals.
Align content assessments to the job. As expert teachers will attest, one grade level is not like another. Good teaching, particularly with students from varied linguistic backgrounds, requires rich combinations of visual materials and activities.
A good 5th grade teacher, for example, understands the developmental needs of children ages 10–11, fills the classroom with objects and materials that interest them, and develops instructional strategies appropriate to their developmental abilities. The same teacher will need retraining, rethinking, relocating, and restocking before teaching at the kindergarten level. We should stop insisting that teachers be able to teach any grade. Instead, we should align standardized tests much more closely with the content and professional knowledge required for teaching specific grade levels.
Differentiate teacher education. We should enhance core teacher education programs with specializations in the different developmental levels of elementary and middle school students. At a time when other professions are proud of specialization, educators can find good cause to provide in-depth preparation for prospective teachers in specific developmental levels.
A primary strand, for example, would include subject matter and pedagogical understandings related to children K–3, an upper elementary strand would focus on 3rd–6th graders, and a middle school strand would address the special needs of students in 6th–8th grades. Credentialing requirements should reflect these different specializations. Texas, for example, has licensure and education requirements for different levels.
If we were to suggest that political candidates be allowed to seek election only if they could pass standardized tests on the complicated issues that might confront them in office, most would argue that such tests could not possibly measure the real skills that political leaders need. Just as we use multiple measures for assessing and electing our legislators and public officials, so, too, should we look beyond standardized tests to evaluate prospective teachers.
