Missouri Advisory Council for Certified Educators
December 5, 2005
Ramada Inn, Jefferson City
The Missouri Advisory Council of Certification for Educators met December 4-5, 2005 at the Jefferson City Ramada Inn.
Members Present:
Della Bell.............................. Missouri State Teachers Association
Georgia Brady....................... Missouri National Education Association
Donna Collins........................ Missouri National Education Association
Tim Ema............................... Missouri National Education Association
Linda Eisinger........................ Missouri Teacher of the Year
Andrea Flinders..................... Missouri Federation of Teachers & School-Related Personnel
Donna Gardner...................... Missouri Association of College for Teacher Education
Linda Gray-Smith................... Missouri Association of School Administrators
Cindy Hart............................. Missouri State Teachers Association
Anna Marie Kulback............... Missouri State Teachers Association
James Murray........................ Missouri Chapter-American Association of School Personnel
Administrators American Association for Employment in Education
Joyce Piveral......................... Missouri Association of Colleges for Teacher Education
Patrick Quick........................ Missouri State Teachers Association
Jane Sestrich........................ Missouri National Education Association
Russell Smithson................... Missouri State Teachers Association
Bob Steffes........................... Missouri Association of Secondary School Principals
Julia Todd.............................. Missouri National Education Association
Gwendolyn Turner.................. Missouri Association of Colleges for Teacher Education
John R. Zelazek..................... Missouri Unit Association of Teacher Educators
Members Absent:
Imogene Clark....................... Missouri State Teachers Association
Tammy Condren.................... Missouri Association of Elementary School Principals
Gale “Hap” Hairston................ Missouri Association of Colleges for Teacher Education
Melissa Jones....................... Missouri National Education Association
Carol Lupardus...................... Missouri School Boards’ Association
Kim Robinson........................ Missouri Federation of Teachers & School Related Personnel
Paula Shields........................ Missouri State Teachers Association
Robert Williams..................... Missouri Community Colleges Association
DESE Staff Present:
Rusty Rosenkoetter............... Executive Secretary, MACCE
Karen Shanks........................ Educator Certification
Rosalyn Wieberg................... Recruitment & Retention DESE
Visitors Present:
Dee Ann Aull......................... Missouri National Education Association
Lela K. Bunch........................ Missouri School Counselors Association
Mark Ehlert........................... University of Missouri-Columbia
Scott Fiedler.......................... Missouri State University
Bill Foster............................. Educational Development Project
Penny Greene....................... Maryville University
Cindy Whitaker...................... Missouri State Teachers Association
Mike Walker.......................... Educational Development Project
Call to Order
Patrick Quick called the meeting to order.
Adoption of Agenda
Donna Collins made the motion to adopt the agenda with flexibility, seconded by Russell Smithson. Vote: 16 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstentions.
Approval of September 26, 2005 Minutes
Linda Grey-Smith made the motion to approve the minutes with one correction, seconded by Donna Collins. Vote: 16 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstentions.
Public/Guest Welcome and Introductions
Patrick Quick welcomed the guests and introductions were made.
Report on Commissioner’s Conference Call
The conference call was very informative. Most of the discussion was about retention and mentoring. Please see Hap Hairston’s attached memo.
Executive Secretary Reports
TAC Information
Rusty gave an explanation of the TAC distribution maps that were handed out at the meeting.
Donna Gardner would like to see a map of district’s whose teachers transfer in and out, to better determine which districts are losing teachers and which are gaining teachers. DESE does not have that data available.
Closing the Achievement Gap
Gwendolyn Turner gave a report from a meeting that she attended. There was discussion about test score differences between white and non-white students. She will email out to everyone the information that was covered in the meeting.
Dr. Jones will attend the February MACCE meeting to provide an update.
Report on Visit from Federal Monitors and NCLB
Rusty gave the report from this federal meeting. They spent the first day in the St. Louis public schools and then came to Jefferson City for a meeting with DESE. There were people from Federal programs, certification and educator preparation. Missouri rated well in having high quality teachers in the classrooms teaching the subjects that they should be teaching.
A hot topic was, “How do you define high quality?” Nationally they want you to have a degree in the subject area. This is not a problem in any field except for Elementary and Special Education. The federal government does not like the fact that Missouri does not have a rule. They are not going to agree with that and want a HOUSSE Rule established in order to have another way to determine which teachers are highly qualified.
Discussion was entertained that Missouri should have been doing this all along and that we should already have a way to report highly qualified. Some members would like to see a plan in case we would have to come up with another way to define high quality.
Gwendolyn asked that if we have to do a questionnaire on highly qualified, could it be done online?
The ultimate penalty is the withholding of federal funds. They have never withheld funds from any other state agency.
Rusty also reported that the State Board had approved new graduation requirements totaling twenty-four hours for high school seniors. Family and Consumer Science and Business Education are putting together the new personal finance class included in these requirements.
Recruitment & Retention Report on TTP
Rosalyn Wieberg and Mark Ehlert talked about the Transition to Teaching Project and recruitment & retention. The recruitment & retention report continues to monitor several areas: the number of teachers that are minority, age and experience of teachers, and retention of teachers for a longer period of time. The trend in Missouri was comparable to the national average for teachers who change their careers.
Mark Ehlert gave a report on the Transition to Teaching Project study that was done in August 2005. The study provides information on how many teachers are in the TTP by tracking the ones that have enrolled in the summer camp for TTP teachers.
There were 69 teachers that went through the TTP program in summer 2004 who were in the public school workforce in 2004-2005 in some capacity. Since there are only 69 people in that group MACCE would like to see them follow up deeper with the people who were involved in the 2004 program.
Rule Changes
Mike Lucas was unable to attend the meeting. Scott Fiedler from Missouri State spoke about a Visually Impaired (VI) program at the college. The rule change would state that a college would not have to have an undergraduate degree program in that area in order to offer an alternative/innovative certification program.
It was the consensus that there should be a language change that makes it clear exactly what he program requirements are and whether the program should be for post-baccalaureate holders only.
Donna Gardner motioned that it be sent back to Mike Lucas for clarification and returned to MACCE for review before going to the board. Gwendolyn Turner seconded the motion. Vote: 15 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstentions.
Competencies Report
Mike Walker and Bill Foster gave the report on the competencies. Mike gave a short history of the changes made to competencies in the past. Right now they are working on foreign languages and ESOL. They will be working on health education, physical education and music education in the spring.
Foreign Languages (K-12) and ESOL (K-12)
Bill Foster gave the update on foreign languages (K-12). There were several changes in the foreign language standards from draft one to draft three. The competencies now are more in line with ACTFL, Praxis and our other competency based areas. Praxis II exams in Missouri are only available for French, German and Spanish.
There are four strands of standards instead of three now, which are linguistics, language proficiency, culture, and language acquisition. The original competencies have been increased from five to fifteen.
Russell Smithson made the motion to accept this competency, seconded by Anna Marie Kulback. Vote: 16 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstentions.
Mike Walker gave the update on ESOL. There are seven institutions in the state approved to offer the program. There were not a lot of changes in this competency. The only debate was in how proficient the teacher needs to be in another language in order to teach ESOL. The competencies were changed to require a college minor in a second language or near-native language proficiency in a language other than English in order to be considered proficient.
John Zelazek made the motion to accept this competency, seconded by Tim Ema. Vote: 16 For, 0 Against, 0 Abstentions.
Subcommittee Reports
Donna Gardner gave the report on the retention subcommittee. They are still trying to figure out how to measure quality and how to determine if they are retaining quality teachers. They have decided to use nursing as their comparison group. They believe that profession, like education, is mostly female and has a lot of the same concerns as.
Russell Smithson gave the report from the mentoring subcommittee. They want NW RPDC to present at the February meeting. Also, MSTA and MNEA will report on their beginning teacher assistance programs. Each of the committee members are going to bring in examples of mentoring programs from their districts. They will meet at 2:30 p.m. on the date of the February meeting. The commissioner would like to see a directory of mentoring resources. The subcommittee wants to add standards to the mentoring program. This idea is supported by several of the MACCE members.
Other Business
Jim Murray will be leaving MACCE at the end of June 2006.
The meeting in February will be changed to February 26 & 27, 2006.
A back up date in early March will be reserved in case of bad weather.
MACCE Report to State Board
January 12, 2006, (tentative) with Dr. Hap Hairston
MACTE Report to State Board
April 6, 2006, with (tentative) with Becky Widner. Donna will check and see if Becky is still available in April to do this.
Next Meetings – February 26-27, 2006; April 23-24, 2006
Adjournment
Motion was made and seconded to adjourn. No opposition.
Respectfully submitted,
Rusty Rosenkoetter, Executive Secretary
RR/ks
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