"There Are So Many Debates About These Things": Critical Vigilance Among Introduction to Education Students

• In Event: Creating Contexts for Change in Preservice Teacher Education

Abstract

Within polarized political and policy landscapes, Colleges of Education must reconsider how they prepare students to think, speak, and act in regard to public schooling. This research analyzes undergraduate students’ critical changes in understanding within a reconceptualized introduction to education course. Students engaged with contemporary educational controversies through extensive interaction with news media, popular media, policy documents, and educational research. Through the lens of Anderson and Cohen’s (2018) conceptualization of new democratic professionalism, students’ written reflections, discussions, post-course qualitative surveys, and interviews were analyzed alongside instructor reflections. With implications for teacher education programs and teacher educators, findings indicate that focusing student work on controversy can enhance students’ abilities to critically reflect and better articulate their beliefs with nuance and authority.

Authors

• James Kieran Rigney, University of Florida

• Gage Jeter, University of Florida