FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE      
Monday, February 8, 2010

International organization adopts CERRA’s Teacher Cadet Curriculum Standards as National Standard

ROCK HILL—For more than two decades, South Carolina’s Teacher Cadet Program has prepared high school students to become future educators. Now, the program’s standards will influence students worldwide through Phi Delta Kappa International’s Future Educators Association (FEA).

In an effort to better serve its members and best prepare them for a career in education, FEA has adopted the 44 standards embedded in Experiencing Education, the curriculum developed by Teacher Cadet instructors from across South Carolina since the program began 24 years ago. The standards will ensure students participating in FEA—from Honolulu to Hartsville or Goose Creek to Germany—receive similar high-quality instruction and learn the necessary skills to be a quality educator. The Arizona Competency and Indicator List for Education was also used by FEA to form its national standards.

Experiencing Education, the curriculum developed by the Center for Educator Recruitment, Retention, and Advancement (CERRA), has long been a national model for homegrown teacher recruitment. The curriculum, which provides the structure for the Teacher Cadet Program, has been revamped, and the 10th edition will be unveiled later this year after being redeveloped by a team of Teacher Cadet instructors from across South Carolina.

The curriculum centers around four central themes: Experiencing Learning, Experiencing the Profession, Experiencing the Classroom, and Experiencing Education. Each of the program’s 44 rigorous standards have been aligned with standards set forth by the following organizations: Association of Teacher Educators (ATE), Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC), National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS), and the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE).

“We are elated that South Carolina’s Teacher Cadet Program continues to serve as a national model for pre-collegiate curricula for teacher preparation.  The adoption of our curriculum by 34 states not only proves that South Carolina’s innovation in teacher preparation initiatives directly impacts our state’s future teachers, but it is also playing a major role in producing highly qualified, effective teachers for our profession’s national workforce,” said Marcella Wine-Snyder, CERRA Program Director for Pre-Collegiate Services, who was a Teacher Cadet at Charleston’s Burke High School in 1987-88. She added, “This is yet another example that gives credence to South Carolina’s first place ranking in teacher quality,”
 
CERRA Executive Director Dr. Gayle Sawyer believes the endorsement is just what was needed to assist the organization in further establishing itself as a national hub and resource center for homegrown teacher recruitment through the Teacher Cadet Program. In conjunction with this summer’s release of the curriculum’s 10th edition, the recruitment center plans to unveil a new Web site dedicated to the Teacher Cadet Program with online content to supplement the course material used in more than 30 states across the country.

“The endorsement of the Teacher Cadet curriculum follows a history of excellence for the Teacher Cadet Program since its inception in the 1980s,” she said. “That an international education organization should identify the curriculum as the standard for educating and attracting top quality high school students to the teaching profession attests to its continued relevance and future potential.”

The Teacher Cadet Program was launched in four South Carolina high schools in 1985 as a pilot program to address what was viewed at the time as a short-term teacher shortage. The shortage continued to grow, as did the need for high-quality and well-trained teachers. In South Carolina, the program is now available in 170 of the state’s 200-plus high schools and will serve more than 2,500 juniors and seniors this year. The program’s primary goal is to attract the best and brightest students into the teaching profession, which it has been successful in accomplishing as more than 4,000 of the state’s public school teachers are program alumni. A secondary goal of the program seeks to develop an awareness of educational issues so students are better equipped to be advocates of the education and profession.

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About Phi Delta Kappa International:
PDK International, founded in 1906, is the premier professional association for educators. Currently, PDK has more than 35,000 members, including university faculty and administrators, school superintendents, principals, and teachers. The association maintains an extensive network of more than 250 chapters in the United States, Canada, and the nations in Europe and Asia.

About the Center for Educator Recruitment, Retention, & Advancement:
CERRA, an independent state agency located on the campus of Winthrop University, is the oldest and most established teacher recruitment program in the country. The purpose of CERRA is to provide leadership in identifying, attracting, placing and retaining well-qualified individuals for the teaching profession in South Carolina. CERRA’s programs have been adopted at school, district and state levels in more than 30 states in the United States. More information about the Center and its programs is available at www.cerra.org. You can now follow CERRA on Facebook and Twitter.