IUP
Since its founding in 1875, Indiana University of Pennsylvania has progressed and evolved to match the changing needs of those it serves. Today, IUP has a diverse, vibrant, research-based, and student-centered community comprising distinguished faculty members and more than fourteen thousand undergraduate and graduate students from across the nation and around the world.
IUP boasts 145 undergraduate, sixty-one graduate, and ten doctoral programs awarding 2,079 undergraduate, 698 graduate, and 101 doctoral degrees in 2008–2009. Our alumni live in every state in the union and in eight-seven countries around the world. They have included university presidents and state system chancellors, chief executives of leading companies and industries, playwrights and authors, and luminaries of the sports world.
College Mission
The mission of the College of Education and Educational Technology is to provide leading-edge development and growth opportunities for students and professionals in education and allied fields. Teacher education at IUP was the first mission of the university in 1875. The Normal School, together with its Model School, was founded to further the acquisition of knowledge and excellence in teaching as mutually supportive goals. In twelve decades of growth and change, IUP has maintained a commitment to the linked goals of excellence in learning and excellence in teaching. Although the university has greatly expanded, the College of Education and Educational Technology continues the tradition of preparing outstanding teachers to serve all students.
The teacher education programs at IUP include a total of twenty-two initial teacher preparation and eleven advanced preparation programs. A total of fifteen of the initial preparation programs offered are housed by departments from the five other colleges across our campus.
The college is well known for its opportunities to practice “hands-on” learning. More than five hundred candidates participate in early field experiences each semester. In addition, the college places about five hundred candidates each year in public schools for a full semester of supervised teaching experience. Candidates are encouraged to take advantage of a full range of activities offered in culturally and economically diverse urban and rural settings.
Teacher education programs at IUP focus on candidates who are taught and guided by a faculty committed to the preparation of outstanding teachers. Candidates preparing to become educators must exhibit compassion and adaptability, demonstrate and foster critical thinking skills, and model best professional practices. These qualities are developed through coursework and field experiences that emphasize the liberal studies in concert with appropriate professional pedagogy and content. Collaboration is modeled as university faculty, public school personnel, and candidates work together to accomplish the goals of the IUP teacher education programs.
Outcomes
- All of our programs have a 100 percent pass rate on the Praxis II subject assessments, which measure knowledge of specific subjects that K–12 educators will teach, as well as general and subject-specific teaching skills and knowledge.
- All teacher preparation programs with a national accreditation body have received “National Recognition,” demonstrating that they meet the standards of the profession.
- All teacher candidates complete the Teacher Work Sample, which provide evidence that our candidates have a positive impact on student performance out in the field.
- All teacher candidates complete a required e-portfolio highlighting their teaching skills.
- All teacher candidate program completers complete early field experiences (EDUC 242), pre-student teaching (EDUC 342), and student teaching assignments.
- All candidates completing student teaching as required by the Pennsylvania Department of Education were granted certifications to teach in their areas of expertise.
- Grade Point Averages (GPAs) for graduates of our teacher preparation programs ranged between a 3.21 and a 3.98 out of a possible 4.0.
- A 2008 follow-up survey of employers (n=73) of our graduates indicates that our graduates are highly qualified. For example, results from that survey indicate that IUP teacher education graduates score very high in the following area:
- Knowledge of content
- Appropriate use of technology
- Caring
- Creates a classroom environment based upon respect and rapport
- Dedication
- Enthusiasm
- Honesty
- Shows professionalism
- Of the 2007–2008 graduates of teacher preparation programs that responded to our survey, 74 percent (31 out of 42) indicated they were employed in the field of teaching. All of those employed indicated that they felt more than adequately prepared to teach.
Continuous Improvement
IUP has embarked on the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education’s (NCATE’s) Continuous Improvement Model, which requires meeting NCATE’s highest standards in focused areas. In doing so, we have pursued the following improvements:
- The IUP Assessment System has been expanded and improved.
- A rubric outlining the target, acceptable, and unacceptable criteria for the student teaching assessment Form I has been developed.
- The electronic assessment system now includes the Teaching Work Sample and Pre-student Teaching experiences.
- The electronic assessment system has recently been updated to provide greater detail and better ability to make decisions based on the data. This is done so by generating reports that not only indicate the mean, but also by indicating the number of “target”, “acceptable”, “unacceptable”, and “unable to assess” responses for each criteria. By doing so, we are now able to use the assessment system to verify whether a variety of settings has been used for each candidate during their early field experiences, pre-student teaching, and student teaching experiences.
- Diversity efforts have been redoubled
- The Diversity Taskforce was established to insure appropriate use of field experiences and to ensure all candidates are taught how teach in diverse settings. This task force has reviewed employer surveys and found that our graduates perform well in diverse settings. On a scale from 1-5, employers (n=73) in 2008 rated IUP teacher education graduates in the following ways:
- Demonstrate a commitment to equity 3.80
- Are culturally sensitive 3.74
- Hold high expectations for all students 3.80
- Interact with students in developmentally appropriate ways 3.89
- The Diversity Recruitment Committee has been charged with monitoring our plan to insure that we recruit and retain high quality and diverse teacher candidates and teacher education faculty.
