Dayton, Legislators Agree on Alternative Licensure Plan for Teachers (MN)

March 30, 2011

Gov. Mark Dayton’s administration has reached agreement with legislative leaders on an alternative licensing plan for teachers, his office announced Monday.

The bill is designed to give Minnesota schools an infusion of new, mostly young teachers who didn’t attend traditional teaching colleges. Backers say it will raise educational standards and help close one of the country’s worst achievement gaps between white and minority students. Critics say it will only harm schoolchildren by making it too easy to become a teacher.

In a letter to the chairs of the House and Senate education committees, Dayton said the compromise will create an alternative pathway that will address projected teacher shortages, assure that teacher candidates are well prepared and expert in their fields and increase teacher diversity, though he also said he wishes the oversight provisions were stronger.

The chair of the Senate Educatio n Committee, Gen Olson, R-Minnetrista, said both houses could pass the bill as soon as Thursday. She said sponsors were ready to move forward anyway and had set a deadline of last Friday for reaching an agreement. She said they made several accommodations to address Dayton’s concerns.

The agreement is a defeat for the teachers union Education Minnesota. Its president, Tom Dooher, said the bill lowers standards for who can become a teacher.

"Why would you go through a college of education now if all you have to do is pass a test?" Dooher said.

Would-be teachers should have to spend more time under supervision as student teachers to demonstrate that they actually have the skills to teach, Dooher said. He also said teachers should have to have degrees in the specific area in which they’ll teach, which the bill doesn’t require. And he said the bill makes it too easy for outside groups to certify teachers. While supporters talk of closing the achievement gap, Dooher said the students who struggle the most are the ones who need the best-trained teachers.

"It doesn’t make sense to us, as we continually raise standards for students, why we would lower standards for those entering the profession," Dooher said.

Among the alternative certification groups expected to take advantage of the change is Teach for America, a national program that gives crash courses on teaching to select recent college graduates, then places them in struggling schools. It already has teachers in Brooklyn Center and Minneapolis public schools and some metro-area charter schools under a waiver from the state. The bill would make it easier for such programs to operate.

Dayton wrote that he was "most disappointed&am p;quot; the compromise doesn’t give higher education institutions more of a role in overseeing alternative training programs. He said the state Board of Teaching will need to be very careful about approving alternative programs because the plan does not contain as many safeguards as his administration sought to monitor their effectiveness. But he noted that the package gives the board the power to revoke a program’s approval.

Olson said leaving the traditional, college-based teacher training programs in charge would not have resulted in a true alternative pathway to licensing. She said Teach for America has shown it can attract a very high caliber of potential teachers and prepare them to be effective in the classroom.

Education Minnesota is telling its members to urge Dayton to veto the bill as it now stands and will do everything it can to try to change the bill before it reaches the governor’s desk, Dooher said.