Teaching and Leadership
Collaborative Partnerships for Teaching, Research, and Service
The quality of a research institution is not measured just by the quality of its students' learning experience or by the quality of its faculty members' scholarship, but by its capacity to integrate the two. In a professional school, the key to that integration lies in sustained, critical, always-respectful engagement with the profession and those it serves. It depends upon creating a community of learners devoted to service.
The efforts of our students and faculty members to create such a community are supported by an organizational infrastructure of coordinating councils, teacher centers, professional development schools, subject matter academies, specially-funded research and development projects, and skilled staff members, all devoted to nurturing collaborative partnerships between preservice teachers, university faculty, and practicing teachers and administrators.
That infrastructure includes:
The Syracuse University Professional Development School Network: a collaborative partnership between the University and forty-four area schools to foster inquiry classrooms, collaborative preservice training, research, and leadership development. The Network and its Coordinating Council, composed of area educators, university faculty, and pre-service students, provides area educators and students with a voice in the design and administration of our preparation programs. Contact: Dr. Joseph Shedd, Teaching and Leadership Programs.
Academies of Educators (English, Social Studies, Mathematics, Science, Art, Music, and Physical Education): cadres of K-12 teachers, University faculty members, and all undergraduate and graduate students who have been admitted to "candidacy" in the preparation program associated with that academy. Members of each Academy commit themselves to three important goals: (1) promoting excellence in teaching in their subject fields; (2) advancing teaching through preservice teacher education and continuous professional development of practicing educators, and (3) collaborative research and inquiry that address problems of practice in their subject field. Contact: Dr. Joanna Masingila, Coordinator, Secondary and K-12 Education Programs.
West Genesee Teacher Center and Jamesville-Dewitt Teacher Center: professional development centers for educators in the Jamesville-Dewitt and West Genesee school districts, each directed by a full-time coordinator who is a member of the University faculty and who plays a key role in linking our teacher preparation programs with area schools, and each offering extensive inservice programs and support for University-School collaborative research efforts. Contact: Dr. Frank Ambrosie, Director, West Genesee Teacher Center and Mr. Frank Albino, Director, Jamesvile-Dewitt Teacher Center.
New York State Higher Education Support Center for Systems Change: collaborative project, supported by the NYS Department of Education, to support the development of quality inclusive schooling for students with disabilities throughout New York State and in New York City, through training, consultation, and collaboration among teacher preparation programs around the state. Its Higher Education Task Force serves as a vehicle for technical assistance to, and collaboration among, higher education teacher preparation programs throughout New York. Contact: Dr. Gerald Mager, Director.
Psycho-Educational Teaching Laboratory: a clinical laboratory that trains future teachers to identify potential obstacles to individual children's learning and develop intervention strategies for overcoming those obstacles, through actual assessments of roughly thirty preschool through secondary students each year. Contact: Dr. Michelle Marcoe, Coordinator.
The Reading Clinic: a summer clinic that provides children experiencing difficulties learning to read with diagnostic services and one-to-one and small group tutoring, directed by a member of our Reading and Language Arts faculty and staffed by students completing a master's program in reading education. Contact: Dr. Kathleen Hinchman, Chair, Reading and Language Arts.
Facilitated Communications Institute: an institute that sponsors training workshops for future teachers, educators, and parents, as well as research and dissemination of information regarding facilitated communication, an assistive technology and means of expression for persons who cannot talk or whose speech is limited.
The Living SchoolBook: a research and development arm of the School of Education, funded by several public and private agencies, that works collaboratively with area teachers, School of Education faculty members, and preservice preparation students to develop innovative applications for instructional technologies.
Study Council at Syracuse University: a membership organization of more than 160 school districts in central and northern New York. Its mission is "the promotion of educational excellence and supportive relationships between individual schools, school districts, educational agencies ands the School of Education at Syracuse University through ongoing study and dissemination of evolutional theory and practice." Based on assessments of needs and interests, services provided include conferences, issue-related long-term study seminars, and collaborative action research. The Council also creates and disseminates documents of interest to educators and hosts programs relevant to the work of member school boards. Contact: Sandy Trento, Assistant Dean.
Office of Field Placements: coordinates more than five hundred field placements each semester for students in area schools; arranges staff development programs for cooperating teachers and field supervisors in conjunction with the field placements. As students complete each stage of professional training, the office arranges for Academy of Educator meetings to review student portfolio and field inquiry projects. Contact: Kathryn Oscarlece, Coordinator.