Maximizing Community Partners in the Preparation of Exceptional Urban Teachers

• In Event: Roundtable Session 1
  In Roundtable Session: Facilitating Effective Collaboration in Partnerships

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of an intense university-school partnership to enhance the preparation of urban teachers. The teacher educators describe how they have anchored themselves in one school and “looped” with PSTs over the course of their four-semester professional preparation. The authors highlight the mutual benefits of involving and leveraging elementary school teachers and administrators to help PSTs transcend the technical aspects of teaching in order to see the broader sociopolitical reality of schooling and situate themselves within this milieu. The researchers argue for the potential in strategic, longitudinal university-school partnerships anchored in urban schools and juxtapose this partnership against traditional structures of teacher preparation programs that do little to help PSTs transform schooling experiences for students of color.

Authors

• Craig J. Willey, Indiana University - Indianapolis

• Paula A. Magee, Indiana University - IUPUI

• Erika Radford