College of Education

AN OVERVIEW OF THE NATIONAL NETWORK FOR EDUCATIONAL RENEWAL
(Excerpts Taken from a report on the IEI/CEDR/NNER website at:
http://depts.washington.edu/cedren/AERA.htm)

For the past fifteen years and continuing into the present millennium, John Goodlad, Ken Sirotnik, Roger Soder and hundreds of educators across the nation have been involved in a major and complex educational change effort. This effort has come to be known as the Agenda for Education in a Democracy. The organizations conducting this effort are the Center for Educational Renewal (CER) at the University of Washington and its sister, off-campus organization, the Institute for Educational Inquiry (IEI). The primary collaborative organization of schools and colleges/universities through which many of the initiatives have played out is the National Network for Educational Renewal (NNER).

Members of the Network assert that quality schooling for a democracy and quality preparation of educators can best be accomplished by sharing responsibility for the following actions:

The Agenda for Education in a Democracy

The use of the "agenda" is intended to suggest a complex, long-term, morally grounded initiative that has required major commitments over much time by major players devoted to the hard work of authentic educational renewal. Three interconnecting features describe the essence of the Agenda:

  1. a four-part mission -- Moral Dimensions;
  2. an overarching strategy -- the simultaneous renewal of schools and the education of educators); and
  3. a specific, idea-driven set of problems or conditions -- 20 postulates for the education of teachers -- on which to focus renewal efforts.

Operational Goals

The NNER pursues the Agenda for Education in a Democracy and its implementation in member settings, with other educators and partnerships, and in policy arenas at the state, regional and national levels. The Network carries out this commitment through the following practices:

The Moral Dimensions

The Agenda emerged naturally out of the conceptual work leading to the book The Moral Dimensions of Teaching, combined with the findings from the Study of the Education of Educators. Four morally-based dimensions were proposed to ground the Agenda:

  1. Enculturating the young in a social and political democracy. "Enculturation" is meant to convey the idea of preparing future citizens for a "cultural democracy", one marked by the consensus and commonality required for a healthy and functioning civic and democratic society. It is not intended to convey the idea of assimilation or "melting pot" and the loss of important group identities defined by race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and so forth.
  2. Providing access to knowledge for all children and youths. Data from the earlier Study of Schooling confirmed in powerful ways the morally indefensible practices of deliberate and sustained tracking of students. Given the potential power of the variety of instructional practices in the repertoire of good teachers, the only reasonable and responsible conclusion is to prepare good teachers, develop good curricula, and not place structural road blocks in the way of students' access to good pedagogical practices.
  3. Practicing a nurturing pedagogy. Taking seriously the art and science of teaching is indispensable to a morally based agenda for education in a democracy. "Art and science" has been used more as a metaphor then as a specific way to refer to teaching; much of what constitutes good pedagogy can be taught and experienced, and that is why good teacher education programs are essential.
  4. Ensuring responsible stewardship of schools. Educators must take responsibility for much more than just their classrooms and students. They, with their colleagues, must be responsible for the whole of the organization. What goes on between those who teach and those who are taught has much to do with what goes on in the larger educational organization, what decisions are made (and not made) at organizational levels that can impact profoundly what happens in smaller units, like classrooms. All educators, therefore, must see themselves, in a way, as educational leaders, as keepers and nurturers of core values and actions, regardless of their assigned roles.

Strategy

Nothing short of the simultaneous renewal of both schools and the education of educators is necessary for fundamental educational improvement. The argument is as simple in theory as it is difficult in practice: you can't have better schools without better teachers, and you can't have better teachers without better schools. The word "simultaneous," of course, is not meant to suggest literal coincidence of all activities, but rather the coming together of equal partners to meet self-interests while solving common problems - in effect, the principle underlying good school-university partnership. Moreover, use of the word "renewal" is deliberate, given the long history of Goodlad and colleagues advocating for long-term, collaborative change efforts versus the kind of top-down, under-funded "reform" efforts characterizing external accountability mandates.

Guiding Principles for Action -- The 20 Postulates

It is important to emphasize that the mission above was not meant to apply only to K-12 schools; they applied equally well to post secondary and higher education, and particularly to the principles and practices in "ed schools" and their teacher education programs. But how the mission and strategy played out still required a more specific set of guiding principles that were clear about necessary conditions, but that left room for creative implementation. These conditions made up the third part of the Agenda, and were the "postulates" that both guided and were reaffirmed by the previous Study of the Education of Educators. Additionally, necessary conditions for partner or professional development schools emerged from NNER research as well as those for "centers of pedagogy", the latter being long advocated by the project for bringing together partner schools, participating arts and sciences faculty, and teacher education programs under one, autonomous and responsible, organizational unit.

The 20 Postulates in a "nutshell"

  1. Structural conditions that specify the importance of institutional leadership, commitment, and support; fair and appropriate reward systems for faculty; and autonomy and fiscal security for the programs. (Postulates One through Three)
  2. Faculty (clinical and academic) responsibilities that specify clearly who are accountable for all aspects of program delivery and who are qualified to teach in and select students for the program. (Postulates Four through Six)
  3. Programmatic responsibilities pertaining to selecting and ensuring well-educated, self-actualized, caring, critically inquiring, and civic-minded future educators who see these same features modeled by programs morally committed to both equity and excellence. (Postulates Seven through Thirteen)
  4. Curricular conditions that specify the importance of programs that help students challenge constructively the status quo of schooling, place cohorts of students in exemplary partner schools, prepare students to deal with the realities of schooling, and maintain linkages with graduates to both support them and evaluate the program. (Postulates Fourteen through Seventeen)
  5. Regulatory and policy conditions that specify licensing, certification, and accreditation requirements consistent with all of the postulates and allowing no backdoor entry routes into the teaching profession. (Postulates Eighteen through Twenty)

Projects/Activities

The NNER now consists of 17 settings in 15 different states comprising 40 colleges and universities (and their teacher education programs) in collaboration with over 700 reported partner schools. (Some settings were partnerships involving several or more universities.) A sample of key projects/activities include such things as the:

  1. Leadership Institute, an IEI-based, capacity-building program that had trained 4 cohorts (113 school and university based educators) in four, five-day, inquiry-oriented seminars dispersed over a calendar year, covering the many conceptual issues forming the Agenda;
  2. major incentive awards to NNER settings willing to tackle tough issues in renewing their programs (e.g., moving to cohorts; increasing diversity, developing authentic partner schools, etc.);
  3. secondary partner school project to foster professional development schools at the more difficult secondary level
  4. diversity in teaching and teacher education initiative to address the perennial concern of too few people of color joining the ranks of the teaching profession;
  5. well-educated teacher initiative to focus on the education of future educators outside the schools of education (the "pre-ed" curricula); and
  6. development of democratic character in the young initiative, focusing on the concepts of curricula that every member of our social and political democracy - particularly those entrusted to teach the nation's children - should experience .

NNER Members

  1. BYU-Public School Partnership
  2. California Polytechnic State University
  3. City University of New York and the New York Public Schools
  4. Colorado Partnership for Educational Renewal
  5. Connecticut School-University Partnership
  6. Hawaii Institute for Educational Partnerships
  7. Metropolitan St. Louis Consortium for Educational Renewal
  8. Miami University
  9. Nebraska Network for Educational Renewal
  10. New Jersey Network for Educational Renewal at Montclair State University
  11. South Carolina Network for Educational Renewal
  12. Southern Maine Partnership
  13. Texas A&M University
  14. University of Texas at El Paso
  15. University of Washington
  16. Wright State University
  17. Wyoming School-University Partnership

Twenty Postulates Necessary for the Simultaneous Renewal
Of Schools and the Education of Educators

  1. Programs for the education of the nation's educators must be viewed by institutions offering them as a major responsibility to society and be adequately supported and promoted and vigorously advanced by the institution's top leadership.
  2. Programs for the education of educators must enjoy parity with other professional education programs, full legitimacy and institutional commitment, and rewards for faculty geared to the nature of the field. (Wording is changed from the original.)
  3. Programs for the education of educators must be autonomous and secure in their borders, with clear organizational identity, constancy of budget and personnel, and decision-making authority similar to that enjoyed by the major professional schools.
  4. There must exist a clearly identifiable group of academic and clinical faculty members for whom teacher education is the top priority; the group must be responsible and accountable for selecting diverse groups of students and monitoring their progress, planning and maintaining the full scope and sequence of the curriculum, continuously evaluating and improving programs, and facilitating the entry of graduates into teaching careers. (There is a slight addition to the original wording.)
  5. The responsible group of academic and clinical faculty members described above must have a comprehensive understanding of the aims of education and the role of schools in our society and be fully committed to selecting and preparing teachers to assume the full range of educational responsibilities required.
  6. The responsible group of academic and clinical faculty members must seek out and select for a predetermined number of student places in the program those candidates who reveal an initial commitment to the moral, ethical, and enculturating responsibilities to be assumed, and make clear to them that preparing for these responsibilities is central to this program. (This statement includes an addition to the original.)
  7. Programs for the education of educators, whether elementary or secondary, must carry the responsibility to ensure that all candidates progressing through them possess or acquire the literacy and critical-thinking abilities associated with the concept of an educated person.
  8. Programs for the education of educators must provide extensive opportunities for future teachers to move beyond being students of organized knowledge to become teachers who inquire into both knowledge and its teaching.
  9. Programs for the education of educators must be characterized by a socialization process through which candidates transcend their self-oriented student preoccupations to become more other-oriented in identifying with a culture of teaching.
  10. Programs for the education of educators must be characterized in all respects by the conditions for learning that future teachers are to establish in their own schools and classrooms.
  11. Programs for the education of educators must be conducted in such a way that teachers inquire into the nature of teaching and schooling and assume that they will do so as a natural aspect of their careers.
  12. Programs for the education of educators must involve future teachers in the issues and dilemmas that emerge out of the never-ending tension between the rights and interests of individual parents and interest groups and the role of schools in transcending parochialism and advancing community in a democratic society. (This postulate has been slightly revised and expanded.)
  13. Programs for the education of educators must be infused with understanding of and commitment to the moral obligation of teachers to ensure equitable access to and engagement in the best possible K-12 education for all children and youths.
  14. Programs for the education of educators must involve future teachers not only in understanding schools as they are but in alternatives, the assumptions underlying alternatives, and how to effect needed changes in school organization, pupil grouping, curriculum, and more.
  15. Programs for the education of educators must assure for each candidate the availability of a wide array of laboratory settings for simulation, observation, hands-on experiences, and exemplary schools for internships and residencies; they must admit no more students to their programs than can be assured these quality experiences. (The word simulation has been added to the original to include an important characteristic of forward-looking programs.)
  16. Programs for the education of educators must engage future teachers in the problems and dilemmas arising out of the inevitable conflicts and incongruities between what is perceived to work in practice and the research and theory supporting other options. (Wording is changed slightly from the original.)
  17. Programs for the education of educators must establish linkages with graduates for purposes of both evaluating and revising these programs and easing the critical early years of transition into teaching.
  18. Programs for the education of educators require a regulatory context with respect to licensing, certifying, and accrediting that ensures at all times the presence of the necessary conditions embraced by the seventeen preceding postulates. (This postulate has been substantially revised.)
  19. Programs for the education of educators must compete in an arena that rewards efforts to continuously improve on the conditions embedded in all of the postulates and tolerates no shortcuts intended to ensure a supply of teachers. (This postulate has been revised to be as constructive as possible in its implications.)
  20. *Those institutions and organizations that prepare the nation's teachers, authorize their right to teach, and employ them must fine-tune their individual and collaborative roles to support and sustain lifelong teaching careers characterized try professional growth, service, and satisfaction. (added 2001)

Goodlad, John I. (1994). Educational Renewal: Better Teachers, Better Schools. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, pp. 72-93.

Brigham Young University-Public School Partnership

California Polytechnic State University

Colorado Partnership for Educational Renewal

University of Connecticut

University of Hawaii/Hawaii Institute for Educational Partnerships

Miami University of Ohio

Montclair State University/New Jersey Network for Educational Renewal

Nebraska Network for Educational Renewal

Metropolitan St. Louis Consortium for Educational Renewal

South Carolina Network for Educational Renewal

Texas A&M University

University of Southern Maine/Southern Maine Partnership

University of Texas at El Paso

University of Washington

Wright State University

University of Wyoming/Wyoming School-University Partnership