Evolution of Teacher Preparation Programs. Reflection 1

Not many people are familiar with the medieval guild system in which special trade skills were learned through an apprenticeship process. A master of the trade would teach a student the skills needed for a specific craft until the student was capable of performing without the master. This was the same system used to prepare teachers during the time of colonial America.

According to “Teachers, Schools, and Societies” most teachers did not even graduate secondary schools. Only a small percentage of educators were able to teach at a secondary level, although it was mostly private tutoring. It was not until the nineteenth century that a form of teacher education emerged. Teachers were now able to receive a two year training in which they would learn standard practices as well as the subject matter. Horace Mann’s “normal” school signified a very important step in the evolution of teaching. By having a state funded teaching school, Mann set the standards that all aspiring teachers would follow.

By the early twentieth century teaching had become a woman’s occupation and specific contracts had to be followed. As time progressed and a bigger percentage of people began to attend school, the problems associated with and old system began to emerge. By the nineteen eighties a demand for better teacher professionalism and preparation took center stage in America. Groups like the Carnegie Forum and authors like Henry Holmes introduced reports depicting the problems with a lack of professionalism in teachers and a solution that involved more preparation years in college and better schools of education.

The reforms made in the eighties led the way for professional standards developed in the nineties that are still in effect today. The licensing of teachers and the creation of the board for teaching standards, helped distinguish talented teachers that exceeded in the field and would endow those teachers with a “board approved” certification. The reforms and creations of specialty boards in recent years were major improvements in the standardization of the teaching profession. The evolution of teacher preparation programs has indeed evolved positively in the last hundred years and it continues to evolve everyday as teachers and others continue to improve the profession.