just say "no" to student teachers

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Home : 2005 : May : 30

just say "no" to student teachers
By I love my job!

I've been teaching for 16 years. I have had 6 student teachers and supervised several other teachers experiencing practicum placements. After this year I will never have another student teacher again! I have always appreciated
the hard work these ladies and gentlemen have put forth in extensive four or five year education programs.
This year, a local university with an international reputation for its teacher prep programs instituted a "just add water" training program for people who,with little or no pedagogical experience, are placed into schools where they exist as "co-teachers" for a full year.

The only requirement is that you have a bachelors degree. The degree can be in any field of study. This learning on the job is accompanied by two evenings a week of classes and a monthly seminar. I have NEVER seen a group of inexperienced people being as lauded or coddled into believing that they are going to be the saving grace of public education. The ST I had kept telling me that she was just going to get her degree and then decide if she was going to teach because she already had quite a nice pension from her first job. And she was going to be sitting in my classroom? No committment, no real desire to connect - her supervisor couldn't understand why I wasn't giving her proficient ratings - the supervisor felt I was being unfair. Unfair? I planned lessons, gave materials, assisted this person with research and videotaped lessons so we could review her performance and work out the pluses/deltas. She left my classroom after six weeks because she felt "unsupported". Yikes!!! Several other teachers in this program complained to their supervisor that teachers at our school were asking them to teach too often and it was, to quote one of them, "a lot of hard work to teach and go to school at the same time." Is this not what you knew going into this???

Every experienced teacher will tell you that good teaching comes from connecting expectations, opportunity and performance for the children. The school I teach at has a principal who "desires" student teachers because she is seeking an adjunct professorship with this teaching university. We had no choice in saying yes or no. Never again will I have student teacher that is involved in this kind of program or from this university.