Recruiting, Preparing, and Retaining High Quality Secondary Mathematics and Science Teachers for Urban Schools: The Cal Teach Experimental Program.

Abstract

Recruiting, preparing, and retaining high quality secondary mathematics and science teachers are three of themost critical problems in our nation’s urban schools that serve a vastmajority of children from socially and economically disadvantaged backgrounds (Council on Science and TechnologyandtheCenter for theFutureofTeachingandLearning,2007; EdSource, 2008; Rumberger, 1985). Although the factors contributing to these problems are complex, one area that has caught the attention of leaders of the teacher education community centers are the alternative pathways (or routes) throughwhich teachers are trainedandallowed into the profession (Hanushek, Kain, O’Brien, & Rivkin, 2005). Many of these alternative pathways, teacher educators argue, aim to move teachers into teaching on a fast track and thereby shortchange the necessary training that candidates need to have to become adequately prepared as classroom teachers (Darling-Hammond, 2006).