Washington, D.C. - The National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) today announced the formation of an expert panel on clinical preparation and partnerships, signaling the beginning of a sea change in the preparation of the nation's teachers. The work of the Panel, called the NCATE Blue Ribbon Panel on Clinical Preparation, Partnerships and Improved Student Learning, will culminate in recommendations for restructuring the preparation of teachers to reflect teaching as a practice-based profession akin to medicine, nursing, or clinical psychology. Practice-based professions require not only a solid academic base, but strong clinical components, a supported induction experience, and ongoing opportunities for learning. This redesign is intended to bring educator preparation into better alignment with the urgent needs of P-12 schools. Such changes in the way teachers and other P-12 educators are prepared potentially have far-ranging effects on the structure of schools of education.

Dr Nancy Zimpher, Chancellor, State University of New York System, and Dr. Dwight Jones, Commissioner of Education, Colorado, will co-chair the panel. Other panel members include experts in education research, policy, teaching and learning and leaders in higher education and P-12 schools at the state and local level. The panel will establish a set of guiding principles for the clinical preparation of teachers so that preparation focuses more on building the expertise necessary for effective practice as professionals. This includes the development of candidates’ ability to understand and relate to their students and their needs, development of practical and evidence-based pedagogical skills, and the use of research evidence and judgment in practice.

Teaching has become a vastly different job requiring a different set of skills than it did 50 years ago. Greater diversity among students and the tailored instruction that many of them need, make the clinical aspects of teacher preparation ever more important. Minority students are now the majority in some states. Students with special needs are mainstreamed as a result of disabilities law. English language learners from various countries are studying in classrooms across the nation, as well as students with individual learning plans (IEPs) who need individual help. In addition, some students are highly motivated while others dislike school, are disengaged, and are at risk of failure. Teachers are faced with more challenges than ever before in the history of the United States, and they are now being held accountable in ways that their predecessors were not.

Significantly enhanced clinical preparation may mean, for example, more extensive use of simulations, case studies, analyses of teaching and other approximations of teaching, as well as sustained, intense, mentored school-embedded experiences. Enhanced clinical preparation should give aspiring teachers the opportunity to integrate theory with practice; develop and test classroom management and pedagogical skills; hone their use of evidence in making professional decisions about practice; and understand and integrate the standards of their professional community. These clinical settings also provide the opportunity for evaluating not only what candidates know, but importantly, what they are able to do.

Finally, the professional preparation of teachers cannot be achieved by preparation programs acting alone. Intensive clinical preparation, especially when it is school-embedded, requires the collaboration of all the stakeholders represented on the Blue Ribbon Panel. The group will issue a report of its findings and recommendations when its work is completed, most likely near the end of 2010.

Some schools of education have already developed rich partnerships with districts aimed at boosting P-12 achievement, especially in low-performing schools. NCATE featured a few examples of these schools of education at a June press briefing announcing a redesign of accreditation to help schools of education move to a target level of excellence on accreditation standards, and to encourage institutions to create Transformation Initiatives which focus on P-12 learning needs and improve the evidentiary base of the profession.

The Panel will examine characteristics and elements of clinical preparation in exemplary programs, will review the research, and will make recommendations as to how those characteristics and elements can be supported in policy and through funding formulas at every level -- school, district, state and federal. The aim is to move from islands of innovation which are driving student achievement in certain schools or districts to a culture in which excellence is the norm.

In a follow-up phase, the Blue Ribbon Panel will form a working group to guide changes in NCATE standards and accreditation processes to support more clinically-based educator preparation and working partnerships between preparation programs and P-12 schools. NCATE will pilot proposed changes at sites currently supported by teacher quality grants located in Race to the Top states. A second phase of the work will be guiding the process through NCATE policy boards to implement changes in NCATE accreditation standards to help support the Panel’s recommendations and vision.

Dr. James Cibulka, president of NCATE, said, "The Panel is jointly chaired by leaders from higher education and the states. States, districts, and colleges and universities must work in close collaboration and in new ways to meet urgent P-12 learning needs.” Cibulka commented on the Panel’s influence on accreditation: “The Panel’s work will inform future changes to the NCATE standards and process to support a focus on P-12 student learning to maximum advantage, and to ensure the standards and process truly measure quality in appropriate ways. Revised accreditation standards will help establish new norms in educator preparation," Cibulka continued.

Dr. Nancy Zimpher, Chancellor of the State University of New York System and co-chair of the panel, said, "I am confident that this panel will help create new synergies at the local level, through collaborative partnerships between school districts, states, and higher education working to assess local needs. The operative phrase is 'joint work,' which will entail new expectations and roles for all stakeholders."

Dr. Dwight Jones, Commissioner of Education, Colorado, and panel co-chair, said, "NCATE has taken a bold step in creating this Panel, representative of all stakeholders, to help move forward changes in educator preparation which will better meet P-12 urgent needs. Raising P-12 student achievement in America is an imperative; using our combined resources in new ways to focus on urgent P-12 needs will help reach that goal. I see this Panel as a major step forward in restructuring educator preparation throughout the nation.”

The first meeting of the Panel is scheduled for January 6-7, 2010.

Commissioned papers on induction support, residencies, professional development schools, and other forms of clinical preparation have preceded the work of this Panel, and have led to its formation.

NCATE accredits 667 schools, colleges and departments of education, which produce two-thirds of the nation’s new teacher graduates annually in the United States, and is recognized as a specialized accrediting body by the U.S. Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.