SoE News
University of Houston-Clear Lake, the Galveston Independent School District and Galveston College reaffirmed their commitment and partnership in recruiting and retaining more “home-grown” teachers for the Galveston area. Above UH-Clear Lake President William A. Staples, GISD Superintendent Lynne Cleveland and GC President W. Myles Shelton sign a memorandum of collaboration supporting the Galveston Area Teacher Education Recruitment and Retention (GATER2) Program. The three institutions will work together to identify and assist GISD and GC students interested in a teaching career with the intent that these students will return to GISD as teachers.
University of Houston-Clear Lake, the Galveston Independent School District and Galveston College reaffirmed their commitment and partnership in recruiting and retaining more “home-grown” teachers for the Galveston area, a strategy designed to address a shortage of teaching professionals predicted to grow as more baby-boomer teachers enter retirement.
The three educational institutions are teamed through the Galveston Area Teacher Education Recruitment and Retention (GATER2) program to identify and support GISD and GC students who are interested in pursuing teaching careers. The main intent of the program is to assist and prepare these students to return to GISD as teachers.
“This partnership,” says GC President W. Myles Sheldon, “will help us create a resource of teachers to meet the future needs of our students in Galveston and Texas.”
UH-Clear Lake President William A. Staples agrees.
“The GATER2 program is a great example of how a school district, community college and university can partner to address critical needs in our communities,” says Staples.
Besides providing a pipeline of teachers, explains UH-Clear Lake Collaborative Program Coordinator Jerricia Ulmer, these “home-grown” teachers have added value. They are already familiar with the Galveston community and return to Galveston schools with a built-in sense of pride. The students also recognize them as being “one of us” so they look up to the teachers, Ulmer says. The community benefits as well by retaining local talent who make a positive contribution to the island’s economy, growth and development.
“It’s a win-win for GISD and for us,” says UH-Clear Lake student and GATER2 participant Naomi Long. “We get to work and live on the island. We can stay in our community and work for GISD.”
Long, who has lived in Galveston for nine years, will graduate in Spring 2009 as a bilingual elementary teacher.
“I would love to stay on the island…I love living there,” she adds.
Through the GATER2 partnership students begin taking course work at GC and transfer to UH-Clear Lake to take junior and senior level courses. GISD provides GATER2 students with hands-on classroom training as well as opportunities for employment when their studies are completed. GATER2 advisers are also available to help the student every step of the way – providing advising assistance, career counseling, scholarship funding and employment opportunities.
Janice Lewis is a home-grown GATER2 success story. She graduated from Ball High School in 1975, and began studies at Lamar University the following semester but dropped out after her mother died suddenly and unexpectedly during her sophomore year. Lewis often thought about returning to college to complete her degree, but never found the time nor the courage as the years passed. Then, while working as a GISD secretary, her boss encouraged her to enroll in the home-grown teacher program and GATER2.
Lewis took classes at GC and graduated from UH-Clear Lake in 2005. She is now in her third year at GISD’s Weis Middle School, teaching math and personal finance, and next year she will move to Central Middle School to teach eighth-grade personal finance.
“It’s so much fun. I love it…It’s been a wonderful journey for me from start to finish - and a lot of it had to do with the GATER2 program,” Lewis says, adding that without the program’s support she might have given up that first semester.
“I was so nervous about going back to school…Things had changed a whole lot since I was on campus. The program was such a great resource for me. Whenever I needed something it was like I had my own personalized, one-on-one adviser and counselor,” Lewis explains.
The program seeks to identify young students still in high school who express an interest in a teaching career.
“We want to steer them in the right direction,” explains Ulmer. “That can mean ensuring they are taking the right courses, following the right plan, having experiential learning opportunities early on – which can help them be sure of what they are getting into – being exposed to college/university campuses and scholarship opportunities,” she says. “It can also mean helping students realize that they ‘can’ go to college, something that may be hard to fathom for first generation college students or those traditionally underrepresented in higher education due to various barriers.”
GISD Superintendent Lynne Cleveland expressed her excitement about the program that allows Galveston students to continue their education in the area and return to GISD as certified teachers.
“We are blessed to have this opportunity in our community and I look forward to the positive outcomes of this partnership,” says Cleveland.
Additional information is available through the GISD Personnel Office (409-766-5155), the GC Counseling Center (409-944-1220) or the UH-Clear Lake School of Education (281-283-3600).
UH-Clear Lake’s School of Education has established similar partnerships with Goose Creek Consolidated ISD and Lee College; Galena Park ISD and San Jacinto College-North; and Austin High School and Houston Community College-Southeast.
University of Houston-Clear Lake School of Education EC-4 Generalist student Gracie Reyna assists Baytown’s George Washington Carver Elementary School students as part of her yearlong student-teaching internship. Reyna’s three-member mentoring team – (background) Pre-Service Teacher Supervisor for Goose Creek Consolidated I.S.D. Annese Jones, UH-Clear Lake University Supervisor Pat Hutchins and Fourth-Grade Mentor Teacher Susan Hales – provides support and assistance for the novice teacher as she prepares to launch her career. UH-Clear Lake’s Pre-Service I & II Internship program was named winner of the Distinguished Program in Teacher Education Award by the Association of Teacher Educators. The program is credited with drastically reducing teacher attrition rates and assuring new teachers are well-prepared and ready for classroom assignment. George Washing Carver students pictured are (front, r to l) Rubi Olvera, Michael McCoy, (back l to r) Elizabeth Thompson and Susan Aramburo.
University of Houston-Clear Lake’s School of Education and its 10 partner schools districts won national recognition for an internship program that not only prepares teachers who can make a difference in area classrooms, but one that also helps ensure those teachers remain in the classroom.
The Association of Teacher Educators bestowed its highest honor, the Distinguished Program in Teacher Education Award, upon UH-Clear Lake’s Pre-Service Internship I and II program. The national award recognizes outstanding programs that demonstrate strong, viable partnerships between education agencies such as local school districts and institutions of higher education in the preparation of quality teachers.
“One of the biggest hurdles in the teaching profession is retention,” says Annese Jones, Supervisor of Pre-Service Teachers for the Goose Creek Consolidated Independent School District. “We have so many teachers that leave in the first five years because there is so much more to teaching than people outside of teaching realize or could even comprehend.”
In fact, the national average retention rate is 50 percent among new teachers in the first five years, but among UH-Clear Lake teacher graduates retention is a remarkable 80 percent.
“The high retention rate comes from the fact that when they (the UH-Clear Lake graduates) get into that first year of teaching they are more prepared for it,” says Jones. “They have a better idea of what’s coming, what’s expected and how to handle it because they’ve spent a full year in the classroom gradually taking on more of the responsibility the teacher has – and they’ve done it with a lot of support.”
While most teacher preparation programs – there are 160 such programs in the state of Texas – require student-teachers have only about 12 weeks of classroom teaching before being certified, UH-Clear Lake, through its Internship I and II program, requires its teacher candidates to experience an entire school year. During that year, the intern receives support and guidance not just from one instructor, but from a three-person mentoring team comprised of experienced, professional educators from the university, the school district, and the classroom.
“It’s the most comprehensive program both in time and requirements,” says Jones, who has worked in partnership with UH-Clear Lake since the internship program began in 1992. “It’s a tough program, but it’s a good program.”
Internship I introduces the teacher candidate to the school, its teachings, philosophies and students. The intern is in the classroom once a week and explores different types of classes such as gifted and talented, and special education, and also the classes of the grades above and below the level they will teach. This helps the student understand where the kids are coming from and where they’ll go next, explains Jones. In this way they get to know all of the pieces, along with the dynamics of the classroom, and how to prepare lesson plans.
During Internship II the teacher candidate returns to the school and becomes like a second teacher in the classroom of a mentor teacher, an experienced teacher with a proven record of classroom success. Gradually the intern assumes more responsibility until finally they are managing and teaching the class. During this time the student teacher is expected to do everything the classroom teacher does from attending staff meetings, to meeting with parents, and even appearing at evening functions at the school.
So when the new UH-Clear Lake graduate begins his or her teaching career, Jones explains, “They walk in not as a typical first year teacher but more like a second year teacher.”
For UH-Clear Lake Intern II Gracie Reyna, completing her internship at George Washington Carver Elementary School in the Goose Creek Consolidated ISD, the program is invaluable. “It’s a lot of work and it’s really eye-opening. I can’t imagine myself stepping into being in charge of a classroom without the hands-on experience I’m getting now.”
Reyna, who will graduate in May with a Bachelor of Science and an EC-4 Generalist certification, believes, “You take the classes and you think ‘this is what I want to do,’ but until you are in the classroom like I am now and you get the full experience, that is when you know – I made the right choice.”
The intense preparation and extra support and guidance are paying off in other areas as well. The internships are performed at specially designated professional development schools within each of the 10 local independent school districts (Alvin, Clear Creek, Brazosport, Dickinson, Galena Park, Goose Creek Consolidated, La Marque, Pasadena, Pearland and Texas City). These participating schools have shown significant improvement in student achievement as well as teacher development.
In addition, a report by the Center for Research, Evaluation and Advancement of Teacher Education showed that schools within a 75-mile radius of the university, many of whom hire UH-Clear Lake teacher graduates, have experienced a significant, positive change in Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills scores – some as much as 20 points higher in mathematics and 17 points higher in reading.
“The difference is our students are in the same school with the same teacher and students for an entire year,” says UH-Clear Lake Program Area Chair and Associate Professor of Curriculum and Instruction Sue Brown, who also serves as chair of the Teacher Education Program. “They have time to learn the ‘culture’ of the school and become familiar with the students.”
All involved in the program agree it is the teamwork, collaboration and continual evaluation of the internship program that makes it strong and such a success.
“We have a lot of interaction and collaboration from our professional development schools,” says Wren Bump, university supervisor coordinator and chair of the Teacher Education Advisory Committee, a group comprising university and school district personnel who meet regularly to assess and monitor the program, and to determine placement of interns.
Jones adds, “Each party brings a special perspective. When we get together there is a ton of discussion and there is a lot of listening to both sides. The public schools need to hear about the current research and be reminded of theory, and the university needs to hear what life is like day-to-day for the teachers and the challenges they face. I truly believe that’s why the program is as successful as it is. It’s a good mesh of the two.”
Accepting the award in New Orleans on behalf of UH-Clear Lake and its consortium at the annual ATE conference were Bump, Brown, Jones and UH-Clear Lake Center for Professional Development of Teachers Director Harriet Sturgeon.
For more information about teacher education at UH-Clear Lake, visit the School of Education Web site, http://soe.uhcl.edu.
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