NSF Award
0119078
This research and evaluation project is examining the effects of training prospective teachers to deliver math and science instruction in conformity with newly established content and pedagogical standards. The specific context in which this initiative is being investigated is the New York City Collaborative for Excellence in Teacher Education (NYCETP), a consortium of five campuses of the City University of New York (CUNY) and New York University (NYU). Since 1995 (with a grant from NSF), these six colleges have embarked on a collaborative journey of curricular reform in which 30 math and science content and math and science methods courses have been CETP reformed, in keeping with nationally recognized standards (e.g., NCTM & NRC). The current project is a three-year longitudinal study examining how prospective teachers exposed to CETP reformed courses in three NYCETP colleges change and develop in comparison to teacher trainees exposed to non-reformed (traditional) courses. This study is being coordinated with, and will contribute to, an ongoing national NSF-sponsored study of the funded Collaboratives supported through the CETP initiative. This NSF study, the CETP Core Evaluation, is being conducted by the University of Minnesota. In the current project a CETP treatment sample of 175 undergraduate teacher education students in three urban colleges preparing for K-6 teaching are being tracked longitudinally for three years, the last two years of college and the first year of employment. These students, who will have been exposed to 2 to 8 CETP reformed courses, are being compared to 90 students at the same colleges who have been waived out of CETP reformed courses because they are transfer students or because they already have obtained a baccalaureate. Extensive background, course work, and academic achievement data is being collected on all teacher education students as part of New York State Certification Requirements. These data are being added to CETP-specific data (much of it using the University of Minnesota instruments) to form a comprehensive database for the entire teacher education population under study. Specifically, additional outcome data include: knowledge, attitudes, and self-reported teaching strategies as measured by the University of Minnesota Core Student Survey and Teacher Survey; performance on the math and science content sections of the New York State Teacher Certification Exam; and actual teacher performance as measured by the University of Minnesota Core Classroom Observation Protocol. In addition, data is being collected regarding the degree to which the school context is supportive of CETP teaching goals. Specific research questions posed in this study include: How does the CETP treatment group compare to the non-treatment group on the outcome measures above? Are teacher education students at different levels of academic ability affected differentially as a function of their CETP/non-CETP participation? To what extent does the treatment group's performance in the classroom change over time (from student teaching to employment) as a function of CETP involvement compared to the non-treatment group? The significance of this study is in its potential to provide evidence to support math/science curricular reform in teacher education programs nationwide, its ability to shed light on how new models of teacher training can narrow the performance gap among students with different levels of prior academic attainment, how new approaches to teacher training (CETP) can stand up to the pressures of urban school environments that have differential supports for new teachers, and its modeling of the utility of developing and using a comprehensive teacher education tracking system.
