Confronting Reform in Teacher Preparation: One State's Experience

Abstract

This paper summarizes recent proposals for the reform of teacher preparation in the state of Washington and reports the results of a study designed to test the justification of those proposals. The study shows that the three premises on which those proposals are based—the academic competence of teaching candidates is suspect; teacher preparation programs are academically undemanding; and those programs involve little practical work in schools—are erroneous for the state of Washington. The proposed reforms, therefore, are not justified.