Digital competence is crucial for technology integration in education, with teacher educators playing a vital role in preparing student teachers for digitalized environments. In our conceptualization of teachers' digital competence (TDC), we emphasize its embeddedness in a professional context. The Digital Competence for Educators (DigCompEdu)…

Recent decades have witnessed growing attention to child reading education, but research on reading teacher training remains scarce, constituting an impediment to the further advancement of reading instruction. This study seeks to explore the paths to improving reading teachers' professional competence via structured training, using Qinjinmuyu's…

This quantitative study aims to explore the validity of Donohoo et al.'s (2020) Enabling Conditions for Collective Teacher Efficacy Scale (EC-CTES) for fostering collective efficacy in schools and evaluate its relationship to measures of collective teacher efficacy. The instruments used for this study include the EC-CTES, the Collective Efficacy…

In this article, I respond creatively to the recent Australian Government Department of Education Teacher education expert panel [TEEP] report entitled "Strong Beginnings." Released in July 2023 and led by Professor Mark Scott AO, the report outlines problems pertaining to teacher education in Australia. It aims to improve student…

This case study explains the research procedures of a study that measured teachers' digital competency using a questionnaire and used an automated visualization platform to suggest appropriate professional development training based on their level of competency. To achieve the goal, the process was started by developing standard indicators for…

The Performance Evaluation Reform Act (PERA) has been the governing legislation for teacher evaluation in Illinois since its inception in 2010. PERA's original purpose was to improve the professional competence of teachers while increasing the academic performance of students. This study explored the perceptions and experiences of a small group of…

This research critically examines the efforts of the British State and the various churches to re-vision the character and status of elementary school teachers in Ireland between the 1830s and the 1920s. In a climate of regular political revolution and denominational hostility, the Westminster government and all churches were anxious to promote…

Licensure tests play a critical role in any profession. Well-designed tests both delineate the core competencies that are required to enter a profession and provide evidence that candidates can safely practice in the profession. They also identify the professional knowledge and skill that differentiates any educated individual from the…

Teacher education quality and effectiveness have been at the centre of policy discussions in the last decades. As part of efforts to improve teacher preparation, law 20.903 requires Chilean universities to design and apply diagnostic tests assessing the construct of their choice to all first-year preservice teachers. Based on these results,…

One significant component that has a demonstrable impact on students' achievement is the professional competence of teachers. The study employed a sequential-explanatory research design, a mixed research approach, and a pragmatic worldview. Semi-structured interviews, standardized scale tests, and document analysis were used to gather data. The…

We investigate the predictive validity of teacher licensure tests using data from the Massachusetts Tests for Educator Licensure (MTEL). MTEL scores predict teachers' in-service performance ratings and contributions to student test scores (i.e., value added). We then explore whether these relationships vary for teacher candidates of color.…

The purpose of the present study was to apply the methodology developed by Raykov on modeling item-specific variance for the measurement of internal consistency reliability with longitudinal data. Participants were a randomly selected sample of 500 individuals who took on a professional qualifications test in Saudi Arabia over four different…

In 2009 New York State began an initiative to improve teaching and learning through the implementation of new teacher certification exams. The Academic Literacy Skills Test (ALST) replaced the much-maligned Liberal Arts and Sciences Exam (LAST) that had been in a legal battle with minority test takers since 1996. Billed as a "basic test of…

National- and state-level education policies are evolving to address teacher shortages that are pervasive across the United States and are particularly problematic in rural special education. In this article, we describe a policy we call "endorsement by exam" in which teachers certified in one subject area can become certified in other…

Initial teacher education programme and paper assessments need to encompass university degree requirements and attest to student mastery of teacher professional competencies. This article reports one aspect of an investigation of the nature and principles employed in the design of assessments for a three-year Bachelor of Teaching (Primary)…