The Dane County New Teacher Project, a consortium of 17 school districts in Wisconsin, believes that new teacher induction is everyone's responsibility. To that end, the group pools resources from member districts to ensure support for new educators as they improve their effectiveness with students, find joy and purpose in their careers, and…

After Ava McCall retired from university teaching in June, 2015, she spent the 2015-2016 school year volunteering in a fourth-grade classroom helping to teach Wisconsin history. Her volunteer work was similar to other retired teachers in the local school district who returned to mentor new teachers, volunteer in classrooms, and serve as substitute…

Improving teacher preparation is critical to long-term improvement in teacher quality. More than 200,000 new teachers enter classrooms each year. Increasing student enrollment, the retirement of baby boom generation teachers, and high attrition in their first five years (between 40 and 50 percent of new teachers leave the profession) have…

Many would say that while there are two ways to enter the teaching profession--traditional and alternative--there seems to be a common way to leave it: quickly. Across the board, more than half of beginning teachers leave teaching before their fifth year, and that percentage is even higher in urban public schools and for those prepared by some…

This paper examines alternative teacher certification in the NCREL region (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin), reviewing relevant literature, analyzing current Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) data, reviewing information on alternative certification programs in these states, and offering results from a survey of…

National statistics show a rise in the number of beginning teachers undergoing formal induction in their first year of teaching. This report discusses the effectiveness of induction programs and resulting outcomes for beginning teacher retention, beginning teacher effectiveness, and mentor participation. The various components of induction…

This paper looks at six mentoring programs in Wisconsin for beginning teachers. Four of the programs (Beloit, Kenosha, Plattesville, and West Allis-West Milwaukee) are district programs in which teachers assume mentoring responsibilities in addition to teaching. In the Milwaukee School District program, veteran teachers serve as full-time mentors,…

As the former director of the Compton Fellowship Program, the author has an in-depth knowledge about the program. When she left the position in 1997, she became interested in doing research on the impact of the program. The author knew that she would filter the events and situations that took place through a lens which would influence her…

Describes six different types of mentoring programs for beginning teachers in Wisconsin. Four (in the Beloit, Kenosha, Platteville, and West Allis-West Milwaukee districts) are district programs in which teachers assume both mentoring and teaching responsibilities. Milwaukee's program is atypical, since teachers serve as full-time mentors. The…

Since 1960, the Teacher Intern Program has offered the best teaching candidates throughout Wisconsin an opportunity to analyze teaching and learning experiences in school settings, interact with experienced colleagues, put into practice what they have learned in school, and receive payment. Internship activities focus on preparing, selecting, and…

This volume focuses on school finance challenges in large urban school districts, fiscal accountability in these schools, and the fiscal dimensions of urban school reform. The 12 papers are (1) "School Finance and Urban Education Reform" (Christopher Roellke and Jennifer King Rice); (2) "Can Whole-School Reform Improve the…

This study was performed to develop a competency-based professional education sequence (termed "spiral curriculum") which would provide pre-service and in-service training for new vocational instructors hired directly from trade and industry. Specific objectives were (1) to identify a comprehensive list of professional education…

A Wisconsin study examined the perceptions of participants in a state-mandated mentoring program for beginning teachers. A researcher obtained names and addresses of beginning teachers, counselors, and librarians as well as personnel serving as mentors to beginners. A total of 14 mentors and 15 beginning teachers, counselors, and librarians agreed…

Many new vocational, technical, and adult education (VTAE) teachers have never taught before and perhaps have never taken a professional education course. The Wisconsin Board of VTAE has developed a spiral curriculum for new VTAE teachers, designed to aquaint them with basic procedures for planning and presenting a lesson, supervising student…

The Standards and Assessment Work Group in Wisconsin developed an assessment framework for performance based teacher licensure. They determined assessment criteria, measurement categories, and contexts for assessing readiness for teaching. The License and Career Stages Work Group devised a licensure system to further enhance the quality of…