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High-Needs Schools Receive High Quality Teacher Training
This feature is the first in a series highlighting the recipients of the 2007 President’s Medal for Social Embeddedness.
“There’s a long standing problem in the U.S. that kids who come to school least ready to learn get the least experienced teachers because other teachers are not willing to go to high-needs districts,” says Dr. Scott Ridley, an associate professor in the College of Teacher Education and Leadership at the West campus. “And teacher preparation institutions usually don’t have focused initiatives to provide good teachers for the districts that need them the most.” “The thinking behind PDS is if you bring high quality teacher preparation to people who live in high-needs school districts, you can promote more stability because they plan to stay in the area.” – Dr. Scott Ridley, ASU West campus associate professor in the College of Teacher Education and Leadership and team leader of PDS
In response to these community problems, Ridley and other ASU faculty members teamed up with seven urban and rural school districts to form the Professional Development School (PDS) program, a teacher training program that brings ASU West campus faculty to urban and rural communities, enabling community members to learn better teaching practices by working in high-needs schools.
“The thinking behind PDS is if you bring high quality teacher preparation to people who live in high-needs school districts, you can promote more stability because they plan to stay in the area,” states Ridley, adding that by working with these school districts, the College of Teacher Education and Leadership benefits by receiving greater insight into the challenges faced by the Arizona educational system.
Much of this insight is gained by full-time ASU faculty members who work in each of the partner school districts as PDS coordinators to teach ASU classes, supervise students, and learn about the needs of each district. Having spent seven years as the PDS coordinator for Osborn School District, Ridley finds that the more a coordinator works with a district, the more the district’s goals become ASU’s goals.
One such goal involves ensuring the education theories PDS students learn relate to issues they encounter in the classroom. To accomplish this, students receive their college courses in the same elementary schools where they practice teaching and are trained in both theory and practice by ASU West campus faculty and elementary school teachers.
“If teachers in our elementary schools have the right degrees and concentrations to work with us as faculty associates, we hire them as ASU instructors,” says Mari Koerner, dean of the College of Teacher Education and Leadership at ASU West. “So the teacher supervising you in the classroom during the day could be your university instructor at night. This lets them create assignments directly related to your classroom experience.” Tips for creating sustainable university-community partnerships
As a result, when a PDS student develops a lesson plan for a college course, he or she can teach that lesson to elementary school children, reflect on its effectiveness, and determine how to improve future lessons. Such intensive clinical practice enables PDS students to become exceptionally competent teachers.
In addition to preparing new teachers, the program seeks to improve the performance of existing teachers in its partner schools with Content Academies – graduate-level ASU online courses designed to increase knowledge of math, science, and reading. The courses are taught at the elementary schools through state-of-the-art video conferencing and help teachers earn their Masters degrees.
“When I was in the Osborn District as the PDS coordinator, we saw you could increase student achievement if teachers learned how to interact with and motivate students – but if teachers didn’t understand their subject area well, that achievement would only reach a certain point before leveling off,” states Ridley. “Offering distance learning courses helps address this issue since if you know your subject matter well, you can be very fluent and flexible and approach a lesson in twenty different ways.”
“I’m very pleased continued professional development is offered at my school,” says Renee Hamill, a PDS graduate and 3rd grade teacher at Encanto Elementary School in the Osborn School District who is earning a Masters in Education with a specialization in Reading through Content Academies. “The distance learning gives us the opportunity to connect with teachers in other districts, discuss the research we’re being acquainted with, and talk about how to apply it to our classrooms.”
Hamill also feels that training to be a teacher in a school with a culturally diverse population has greatly improved her teaching skills.
“One of the strengths of the PDS program is the way the faculty teaches you to be good English Language Learner teachers,” she says. “And all the research shows the methods English Language Learner teachers use in their classes – visual learning, hands-on activities, group work, class discussions, and focused vocabulary instruction – are the same methods teachers should use for teaching all students regardless of language, culture, or income level.”
Ultimately, all of these efforts help increase the achievement of students in high-needs school districts. According to Patricia Tate, assistant superintendent in the Osborn Elementary School District, since Osborn partnered with the PDS program in 1999, student achievement has risen significantly and consistently.
“The PDS program has increased our 7th and 8th grade students’ test scores dramatically and has sustained the increase over a five-year period,” states Tate who testified at a June 2006 Congressional briefing that Osborn Middle School students posted the highest mathematics score of any Title I school in Phoenix in 2005, exceeding the state average of students Meeting/Exceeding the Mathematics Standard.
Tate adds that 20% of Osborn’s current teachers are PDS graduates and 68% of the PDS graduates Osborn hires, stay in the district for at least three years, compared to national statistics that reveal 50% of teachers leave after two or three years. Retaining teachers helps schools spend more time developing better teaching practices and less time helping new teachers adjust.
In the future, ASU West campus faculty plan to continue exploring better practices for teaching and partnering with other high-needs school districts. According to Ridley, a key component to sustaining such positive community-university partnerships is to approach them with a business mentality.
“To have a good partnership you have to treat it as a high priority and share control,” he states. “When we work with a district, we first talk about everyone’s goals and what we want to accomplish. We have detailed contracts that spell out everything – what we’re going to do, what the schools will do, who’s responsible for what, who pays for what. And that helps because when things are vague, things don’t get done.”
Koerner adds that the collaborative culture among the partner schools, ASU faculty, and PDS students is also responsible for the program’s achievements.
“The reason why this program is successful is because of all the supports and connections the sites enable undergraduates to have,” states Koerner. “So it’s the school helping undergraduates learn, it’s ASU faculty helping them learn, it’s the school kids helping them learn. And the more successful undergraduates are, the more likely they are to be effective as teachers.”
The PDS teacher-education program is a 60-credit hour Bachelors of Arts in Education and K-8 certification program (with an English Language Learner Endorsement) that combines theory and practice. Supported by a five-year Professional Development School Teacher Education Network of Excellence through Technology grant project and additional aid from the ASU West campus, seven school districts in urban, rural, and tribal land areas are currently participating in the program. To learn more, visit the PDS web site.
ASU Team Members:
Community Partners:
Michael Jung, ASU in the Community feature writer
To learn more about how ASU is engaged with the community, please visit ASU in the Community’s Program Database which connects you to a wide variety of specific ASU outreach efforts.
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    Enlarge imagePDS graduate and 3rd grade teacher Renee Hamill uses an interactive story to help build a student’s English language skills. Hamill finds that by training to be a good English Language Learner teacher through the PDS program, she has become a more effective teacher for all students. Photo by Eliza Gregory 
Enlarge imageDean Mari Koerner notes that the success of the PDS program lies in the hands-on approach to teaching that students receive as well as the strong collaboration between ASU and the partner school districts. Photo by Eliza Gregory 
Enlarge imageOsborn School District’s Assistant Superintendent Patricia Tate gives current PDS students a test-administration workshop to familiarize them with the rules of the upcoming AIMS test. Photo by Eliza Gregory 
Enlarge image“When you work with a school district, its problems become your problems,” states Dr. Scott Ridley, an associate professor in the College of Teacher Education and Leadership at the West campus. Having worked in the Osborn School District for seven years, Ridley is familiar with the district’s needs, enabling PDS to significantly impact its school system. Photo by Eliza Gregory 
Enlarge imageRecent PDS graduate Chad Kobold wound up being hired to teach in the same classroom where he student taught after his mentor teacher took maternity leave. Here, he provides one-on-one help for his fifth graders. Photo by Eliza Gregory 
Enlarge imageState-of-the-art technology in Osborn School District’s Content Academy Reception Room enables teachers to attend online ASU courses, earn their Masters degree, and qualify for salary increases. The room’s video conferencing capabilities also connect ASU faculty with administrators and teachers from all partner districts, allowing PDS partners to communicate effectively. Photo by Eliza Gregory  |
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