National and State Education Leaders Come Together for State Alliance for Clinical Educator Preparation and Partnerships

The State Alliance was established in 2010 to implement recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Panel on Clinical Preparation and Partnerships for Improved Student Learning, including the following:

• There must be an intense focus on developing teaching practice and P-12 student learning;
• Higher education and school districts must share accountability and responsibility;
• Educator preparation providers must attract more academically prepared and more diverse cohorts of students;
• The reward structure in academe and P-12 schools' staffing models must shift;
• States and accreditation agencies must strengthen their scrutiny, and preparation programs must become more accountable for meeting school needs and improving P-12 student learning;
• States should help ensure that future teachers are prepared to fill the staffing needs of P-12 schools;
• Federal agencies should support a clearly defined research agenda.

Alliance states work with one another and with national experts to pilot approaches to implementation and bring new models of clinical preparation to scale.

WHAT: State Alliance for Clinical Educator Preparation and Partnerships biannual meeting

WHO: National and state educational leaders from Calif., Colo., Ky., La., Md., Mo., N.Y., Ohio, Okla., Ore., and Tenn., including:

David Monk, Professor of Educational Administration and Dean of the College of Education, Pennsylvania State University
Lawrence Picus, Vice Dean for Faculty Affairs, Professor of Education Finance and Policy, USC Rossier School of Education
Karla Eslinger, Missouri Assistant Commissioner, Office of Educator Quality, Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education
"Hap" Hariston, Missouri Director - Educator Preparation, Office of Educator Quality
James G. Cibulka, President, Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation
Ann Nutter Coffmann, Senior Policy Analyst, Teacher Quality, National Education Association

WHERE: Hilton Hotel St. Louis Downtown; 400 Olive Street; St. Louis, Missouri

WHEN: October 18–19, 2012

For more information, please view the State Alliance agenda online at http://caepnet.org/working-together/state-partners/state-alliance.

The goals of the Alliance for Clinical Teacher Preparation—a group of states committed to major transformation of educator preparation policies and practices–are three-fold: (1) to foster collaborative partnerships among schools, districts and higher education, (2) to develop more effective state policies which support innovation, research, strong clinical preparation, and partnerships so that teachers are better prepared to meet the needs and challenges of a diverse student population, and (3) to increase use of formative and summative candidate performance assessments to ensure candidates can demonstrate knowledge and skills needed in today's classrooms, and to collect data on candidate performance in classrooms to help preparation programs improve.

The Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (www.caepnet.org) ensures the preparation of highly qualified educators through the accreditation of programs in which data drive decisions; resources and practices support candidate learning; and candidates demonstrate knowledge, skills, and professional dispositions to raise P-12 student achievement.