Clinical Components of Educator Preparation Programs

• In Event: Roundtable Session 4
  In Roundtable Session: Unpacking the "Black Box" of Clinical Preparation of Educators: An Opportunity for Public Scholarship

Abstract

The intent of this study was to document and explore the common and unique features of the clinical components in our school administration, school counseling, and teacher preparation programs. As a self-study it widened researchers and participants’ perspectives with regard to the complexities of developing educators and assessing their performance through integration of clinical experiences in program curricula. The study integrates a language, theoretical constructs, and a developing knowledge base that emerged from engaging faculty and practitioners in reflection and discourse through designed interviews and focus group sessions. As noted in previous papers this inquiry is situated as part of a larger study on clinical preparation of educators. The research questions that framed this inquiry are:
• What unique and common measures are explicit clinical components of our educator preparation programs that aim to assess candidate performance and impact on the learning environment?
The study involved mapping unique and common clinical components through creation of ‘program profiles’ drawn from interview data with 24 program faculty and program coordinators who represented field-based practitioners. The interview protocol intended to engage participants in dialog and reflection on how the clinical components embedded in their program contributed to developing candidates’ knowledge, skills, and dispositions. Specific focus was on how the activities and practices described related to impacting learning and the learning environment in which candidates were preparing for their professional roles. Nine educator preparation program profiles were constructed from the interview data which included elementary, secondary, special education, school counseling, and educational administration. Profiles articulated emerging themes with explicit descriptions reflecting research participants’ responses. Emerging themes provide the constructs (Grossman, 2010; Shulman 1998) with which to engage others in discussions about clinical preparation including: (a) repertoire of practice as encompassing knowledge, skills, and dispositions engendered in the program; (b) clinical components as situated in key activities and assessments used as performance measures of growth and development of candidates; (c) community of practice(CoP) as an essential venue for candidates to develop professional identity, reflective practices, and ethical orientation to practice; and (d) understanding dispositions as “performances of understanding” viewed overtime across candidates’ clinical experiences (Carroll, 2010). The program profiles constructed from the interview data were instrumental in prompting discourse through presenting a common language with which to talk about clinical practice, theoretical underpinnings, and constructs of a knowledge base made visible for comparison, critique and and validation of clinical preparation with university and field-based constituents who participated in focus groups. Feedback solicited from focus groups validated areas of strength (e.g. reflective practices, linking clinical experiences to learning theories and teaching practices) and areas for improvement ( e.g. clarity in defining roles and responsibilities of school-based mentors, augmenting clinical experiences to engage candidates in addressing needs of diverse learners; situating study of assessments of learning before internship experiences followed by engagement in assessing learning and interpreting data during internship experiences). Feedback from focus groups is aligned within the ‘domains of interest’ which defined the conceptual framework for this study: meta-assessment, curriculum and clinical connections, supervision and mentoring, and program design.

Authors

• Patricia S. Tate, The George Washington University

• Vince O'Neill, The George Washington University

• Kimberly Sloan, The George Washington University