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The School of Education has redesigned their elementary education undergraduate and graduate programs based on new Illinois licensure laws passed on July 1, 2013. The redesigned undergraduate program first became available in the fall of 2014, while the redesigned graduate program was offered for the first time this semester.
The state of Illinois declared that there will be a change from issuing teaching certificates to professional educator licenses. The laws also significantly changed the licensing ranges for Illinois teachers.
Prior to the passing of the new laws, there were three teaching certificates, early childhood education which covered birth through third grade, elementary education which covered kindergarten through ninth grade, and Secondary education which covered sixth through twelfth grade.
Under the new licensure laws, elementary education covers only grades first through six, and a new middle level education program covers fifth through eighth grade. The redesigned secondary education program would only cover grades ninth through twelfth. The state of Illinois mandated that education programs be redesigned to meet these new standards.
The new laws required that the elementary education program be designed by October 1, 2015. Junior and Senior students who are currently enrolled in the old elementary education undergraduate program will not be affected by the changes as long as they stay on track and graduate by September 1, 2017.
While the SXU Education program was required to redesign the elementary education program, Jane Lundin, Director of School Partnerships believes that the requirement gave the department a good opportunity to make some changes.
“It was a good thing in a way, because it prompted us to redesign the program, and after doing it for so many years, there were so many things that we had discovered could be done differently or that we could do better, so it was a nice opportunity,” said Lundin.
According to Dr. Maureen Spelman, the Director of Initial Licensure, who coauthored the new elementary education curriculum with Lundin, a major change in the elementary education program is that students will have more time in schools.
Second semester sophomore students and all junior students will spend half a day in elementary schools every week. Student teaching has also been changed to an entire year instead of just one semester.
“We feel strongly that experience in the school is crucial. That’s where they really get a feel of what teaching is, the day to day, they see things that we can’t show them in classes here on campus,” said Lundin.
Besides redesigning the elementary education program, the school of education also developed two tracks for a middle level education Undergraduate program. One track will give candidates endorsements in math and science, while the second track offers endorsements in English language arts, reading teacher, and social science.
Both Spelman and Lundin agree that the addition of a middle level education program that focuses on preparing candidates to teach students in fifth through eighth grade is a good idea.
“It’s such a critical age, because really that’s moral development, physical development, social development and people need to be specialists in dealing with those really important years,” said Spelman.
Lundin and Spelman spoke about the grueling process to get the elementary and middle level programs approved by the state of Illinois. The process included interviewing area principals and teachers, SXU alumni, faculty members from the Arts and Sciences department, and faculty from the education department about what they would like to see in the redesigned programs.
According to Spelman, the process took about 15 months and the application for each program was over 100 pages each. The applications needed to describe the application, state how all Illinois teaching standards would be met, and include syllabuses for all courses in the program.
They then had to go to Springfield and appear before a panel of the Illinois State Board of Education who had already read the application. The State Board of Education approved all of SXU’s elementary education and middle level education programs.
“We were fortunate that when we went to the state to defend and present our programs, they approved our elementary undergraduate graduate, they approved our graduate program, and they also gave us the approval to offer it completely online which gives us the first in the state to be able to do that,” said Spelman.
All education programs will eventually need to be redesigned to meet the new licensure laws. The early childhood education program is currently being rewritten, and Spelman says that she hopes that this redesigned program will go to the state capital to be redesigned next summer.
The next program that needs to be changed will be either secondary education or special education. Spelman stressed that another important change that people need to be aware of is that the state has raised the admission requirements for education programs.
Candidates who would like to be admitted in the education program need to pass basic skills requirement and keep a high GPA. They also need to pass two content exams before student teaching and pass a final licensure exam before receiving their professional educator licenses.
Yasmeen Abdellatif
News Editor
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