Co-Creating a More Diverse Teacher Workforce through a University-High School Partnership
Eric Hougan, Central Washington University
LEARNER OUTCOMES:
1. Participants will understand key features of a university-high school partnerships to improve teacher diversity.
2. Participants will examine the impact of this university support model on engaging students and the diversifying the educator workforce
3. Participants will explore strategies for implementing similar partnership models for their instructional contexts.
Keywords:
Teacher Diversity, University Partnerships, Co-Collaboration
Key Statement:
Learn about a fun and collaborative university partnership with high school teacher academies that engages students and aims to diversify the teacher workforce.
TRANSCRIPT:
Hello. My name is Eric Hougan from Central Washington University, and I'm excited to share
my poster presentation: Co-creating a More Diverse Teacher Workforce through a University
High School Partnership.
Washington state faces a significant challenge: There's a pronounced
ethnic, racial and linguistic gap between our teacher workforce and the diverse student populations we serve.
Our initiative addresses this issue by expanding and diversifying the teacher workforce through a
supportive partnership model rooted in relationship-building, belonging, and authentic experiences. Now the CWU Teacher Academy support model has four major components. There are faculty connections, advisor connections, student ambassador connections, and campus connections.
For the purpose of this presentation, we'll be focusing on faculty connections. As part of that, strong relationships are critical. Research consistently shows that students with meaningful connections to mentors and faculty are more likely to persist and succeed in their college and careers. These relationships create a sense of accountability, encouragement and belonging, critical elements for completing a teacher ed program.
This program also emphasizes co-learning experiences where students explore racial equity, investigate education legal cases, and how to use AI tools. Survey results have been really promising from this work, and we are excited to share more about this work.
See you soon.
Questions
Join the discussion!
Q&A with Presenters / Poster Reception
Thursday, January 9th, 2025
5:30 - 6:30 PM
Brickstone
Hosted bar + light hors d'oeuvres served.
Name badge required
References:
Carothers, D., Aydin, H., & Houdyshell, M. (2019). Teacher shortages and cultural mismatch: District and university collaboration for recruiting. Journal of Social Studies Education Research, 10(3), 39-63.
Gist, C. D., Bianco, M., & Lynn, M. (2019). Examining grow your own programs across the teacher development continuum: Mining research on teachers of color and nontraditional educator pipelines. Journal of Teacher Education, 70(1), 13-25.
Valenzuela, A. (2017). Grow your own educator programs: A review of the literature with an emphasis on equity-based approaches. Intercultural Development Research Association.
Villegas, A. M., & Irvine, J. J. (2010). Diversifying the teaching force: An examination of major arguments. The Urban Review, 42(3), 175-192.
Zeichner, K. (2010). Rethinking the connections between campus courses and field experiences in college- and university-based teacher education. Journal of Teacher Education, 61(1-2), 89-99.