About Teacher Education

Because teaching is a profession of practice, the Department of Teacher Education focuses on preparing expert practitioners who know their students, their subject-area content, and pedagogy. Efficient practitioners learn these abilities through professional study and by mastering the profession's knowledge base, skills, and dispositions of practice.

Clinical practice provides robust opportunities to develop practitioners through expertly mentored experiences in the field and through pedagogically designed practical experiences. A clinically based approach gives teacher candidates the opportunity to integrate theory into practice, to develop and test classroom management and pedagogical skills, to hone their use of evidence in making professional decisions about practice, and to understand and integrate the standards of their professional community.

The teacher education programs have been approved by the Indiana Department of Education Office of Educator Licensing and Development, the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education, and the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools.