Articles and Opinions

By Aimée Dorr

Eleven years ago UCLA began a radical transformation of its teacher education program (TEP), aiming to prepare transformative professionals for traditionally under-served urban schools in Los Angeles. The schools we aim to serve are responsible for educating low-income racially, culturally, and linguistically diverse students – young people who are the very future of the city.

Today, UCLA sends 150 new teachers into LA’s high-poverty urban schools each year. They have completed a two-year, accredited post-baccalaureate program and earned a master’s degree. As a group, they are as diverse as Los Angeles itself – no single ethnicity is a majority, compared to a national teaching force that is about 80% White. They are all considered to be highly qualified teachers. Moreover, of those who are full-time classroom teachers one to five years after TEP, fully 98% are in Title 1 schools.

Capitalizing on our location in a major research university, TEP faculty use education theory and research to guide the program’s design and our students’ experiences. They also study the program itself and, among many lessons learned, have identified three that stand out.

First, considerable attention must be given to ensuring that new teachers are equipped to promote instructional equity and high achievement for low-income racially, culturally, and linguistically diverse students. Through activities such as community asset mapping and coursework on culture and urban education, the program seeks to develop pre-service teachers who appreciate the assets of students, their families, and their communities. Teachers must know that their students are capable of high achievement and expect that of them; they must be ready to deal productively with differences across race, culture, and class; and they must teach English language learners effectively to ensure that all students are college prepared.

Second, pre-service teachers can become transformative professionals. They need to understand the history of schooling and its sociopolitical context. They must be supported in developing future-oriented visions of public schools that are democratic and caring – as well as demanding – for all children. Their commitment to a social justice agenda is strengthened by examination and debate. And they benefit from explicit teaching about effecting social change in one’s own school.

Third, teachers in high-poverty urban schools need sustained support. TEP faculty support them for at least two full years, the first as student teachers and the second as full-time teachers. Thereafter, the Urban Educator Network provides continuing connections among graduates and faculty. Moreover, each year— and year after year—at least two TEP students take positions in the same school, thus building a supportive network in their own school. In one high school, half the science teachers are now from UCLA. In three years, the number of Advanced Placement (AP) students in that school has tripled. In 2005, for the first time, students scored 4s and 5s on the AP biology exam and, last year, students participated in the Los Angeles County science fair, with one advancing to the state competition. Examples such as these, principals’ positive regard for program graduates, and graduates’ longer-than-average retention in the classroom all suggest that the program is achieving its goals.

Improving the quality of teaching in our urban schools is one of the most critical and daunting issues facing our society. Providing highly educated teachers for those schools, sustaining them, helping them develop professional networks, researching their experiences, and disseminating the findings—this is the work of a great research university. At their very best, schools of education provide the bridge between research and practice. The laboratory for the teachers in the TEP is the urban classroom.

To learn more about the UCLA Teacher Education Program go to: http://www.centerx.gseis.ucla.edu/tep/ and to: http://idea.gseis.ucla.edu/publications/utec/

Aimée Dorr is Dean of the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, University of California, Los Angeles.