Center Calls on Governor to Ensure All California Students Have Access to Teachers They Need to Achieve State's Ambitious Education Standards.

News Editors/Political Writers/Education Writers

SACRAMENTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 10, 2003

A new report released today by the Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning concludes that the persistent assignment of the least prepared teachers to students with the greatest needs is unfair and inequitable, and that the state's patchwork system of teacher development falls short of building a teacher workforce capable of helping all students reach California's academic standards. Citing the findings of its report, the Center asked Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to act to ensure that all California students have access to the prepared and effective teachers they need to meet the state's ambitious standards and federal requirements for student achievement.

"Candidate Schwarzenegger said `we need to have the best teachers in inner-city schools where there are lots of problems.' He was absolutely right," said Margaret Gaston, executive director of the Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning. "It is exactly in these schools the Governor is talking about that students continue to be assigned teachers who are the least experienced and least prepared to meet their needs. Hardest hit are special education and English language learning students from poor, urban areas. We hope Governor Schwarzenegger will act now to address the crisis."

The Center made their request to the Governor and the Legislature as they released "The Status of the Teaching Profession 2003: Research Findings and Policy Recommendations." The new report concludes that while the supply of teachers is increasing, there are significant shortages in key geographic, subject matter, and special program areas such as special education, and also finds that California's least prepared teachers continue to be unfairly distributed among low-achieving schools serving poor, minority and English language learning students. Further, the report finds that California faces serious challenges in how it prepares, ushers into the profession, and supports its teaching workforce.

"This report shows us that the state needs but does not have a system of teacher development that ensures that all who enter the classroom have the knowledge and skills they need to help their students reach the academic standards the state has set," said Patrick Shields of SRI International and the principal researcher for the report. "Instead, we have an inequitable and inadequate patchwork of programs that result in the least prepared teachers getting the most difficult assignments with the least support. We're calling on the governor to make the development of a coherent teacher development system a priority for his administration."

The new report cites particular problems with teachers assigned to special education and in schools serving English language learning students in poor, urban areas. Eighteen percent of special education teachers in California did not hold a full teaching credential during 2002-2003. Further, 62 percent of first- and second-year special education teachers do not yet have a preliminary teaching credential and lack training to help students with special needs reach the state's ambitious academic standards. And because these teachers have not earned a credential, they are not eligible to participate in California's Beginning Teacher and Assessment Program (BTSA), the state's primary means of support for new teachers. Students in schools with high percentages of English language learners are more than twice as likely to have underprepared teachers. In schools with more than 40% English language learning students, 16% of teachers were underprepared, compared with 7% of teachers in schools with less than 6% English language learning students.

"Given the requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act that all children, including those in special education and those learning English, meet the new standards in reading and mathematics, all of our schools should be equally able to get them there. But the inadequacy of the state's patchwork of teacher development programs to ensure that all students have fully prepared and effective teachers is placing California schools on a collision course with rising state and national expectations for student achievement," said Gaston.

"If California's children are to reach the state's ambitious education standards, then we need a teacher development system that can consistently deliver a high quality workforce. This should be a top priority for the new Governor and Legislature."

The findings and recommendations of the report are available online at www.cftl.org.