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Teachers College offers new paths to education career

The Mary Lou Fulton Teacher's College, located on Tempe's campus, offers a full range of classes for those who seek to become educators in both secondary and elementary schools. (Photo by Dominic Valente)
The Mary Lou Fulton Teacher's College, located on Tempe's campus, offers a full range of classes for those who seek to become educators in both secondary and elementary schools. (Photo by Dominic Valente)

The Mary Lou Fulton Teacher's College, located on Tempe's campus, offers a full range of classes for those who seek to become educators in both secondary and elementary schools. (Photo by Dominic Valente) The Mary Lou Fulton Teacher's College, located on Tempe's campus, offers a full range of classes for those who seek to become educators in both secondary and elementary schools. (Photo by Dominic Valente)

The Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College will offer new degrees in partnership with the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, as well as a certificate program open to all majors, next fall.

The new bachelor's degrees will be English, mathematics, physics and history with concentrations in education. The degrees and certificate will leave students prepared to teach grades 7-12 after graduation.

The mathematics program has already started, and the other degree programs have students signed up to enroll when they begin in the fall, said professor Elizabeth Hinde, director of teacher preparation for Teachers College.

Before these programs, students could only become teachers through the secondary education major. Secondary education majors are based in education classes and choose concentrations in the subject they want to teach.

Students who decided they wanted to teach later in their studies would have to come back and do graduate work.

Hinde said the Teachers College hopes to improve the teacher shortage through the new degrees and certificate, especially in the areas of math and science.

Many teachers are forced to teach subjects that they don’t have strong backgrounds in to address the shortage, she said.

“That’s why we came up with the three different pathways,” she said.

Hinde said the Teachers College also wants to attract excellent students to the teaching field. The new programs will allow them to take more classes in their area of interest, and Hinde said the certificate will be ideal for students who enter ASU with a year’s worth of academic credit completed.

“We want to prepare teachers who are excellent at teaching and who will stay," she said. "And that’s what our program aims to do."

Hinde said she didn’t think there would be much difference between graduates from the secondary education and new programs once they are out in the field.

The programs are more about encouraging students to follow their passion if they want to be teachers, she said.

She said students are often discouraged from becoming teachers in favor of other careers or just because of misconceptions about the job.

Hinde said students should embrace teaching if that’s what they want to do.

“They’re all young adults; they should do what they want with their life," Hinde said. "And if it’s teaching, then come on over."

Molly Britton, a secondary education freshman with a concentration in English, said she wishes the programs were available when she enrolled in ASU.

“I wish they had that option right now,” she said.

She said she was torn between choosing a general English degree or an education degree with an English concentration. She ended up choosing an education major because she decided it would be more useful after graduation.

Katherine Moeur, a biological sciences freshman, said she has considered teaching and would possibly be interested in the Teachers College’s new certificate.

She said it takes a science major to make a good science teacher and the new certificate would be a good option for that.

“That way, you can still focus on what really matters to you, which is science, but still have the skills to teach it as well," Moeur said.

 

Reach the reporter at ammedeir@asu.edu or follow her @amy_medeiros


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