"This equal emphasis on competence in teaching and on understanding of the subject-matter field," Keppel declares, "presupposes a unity of purpose within the University for the preparation of teachers. The courses in the Faculty of Education are designed with this unity in mind and . . . the policies for the degree are established through the active cooperation of scholars in the field of Education and in the academic disciplines."
At a Faculty meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences last term, Keppel proposed that the jointly sponsored A.M.T. program be continued. In previous years there had been overlapping and inconsistent legislation by the Faculty towards the program. Provost Buck, with the help of Keppel, codified this legislation, and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted unanimously for continuance. The vote represented a Faculty vote of confidence in the A.M.T. program, and another example of greater cooperation between the two areas at the University.
Teachers Attend School
The second career program at the School is for experienced teachers who are seeking advanced positions such as principal, director of guidance, and so on. Third division of preparation is more academic. It is for those experienced school administrators who wislr to become professors, scholars, teachers of teachers, or just better administrators. This last program leads to the degree of Doctor of Education.
The Graduate School of Education is cooperating with 21 other Eastern Liberal Arts Colleges in its undertaking to train secondary school teachers. Concerned over the disproportionately small number of students who are going into public teaching, educators from these colleges, in conjunction with the Graduate School of Education, have drawn up a plan to increase interest among their students in secondary and elementary teaching. Fellowships for a year's study at the G.S.E. will be available to those who qualify next year when the program will begin.
Grants of $45,000 for fellowships, and $33,000 for instruction and administration, will be given annually for three years by the Ford Foundation.
"Truce Among Educators"
Representatives from the cooperating colleges felt that professors in their colleges have often mistrusted "education" courses and teachers of "education" and as a result have not suggested teaching as a possible career to promising students. The program was designed therefore to improve this situation by relating the undergraduate program with the graduate study of education, and to provide accurate information on the occupational details of public school teaching.
The program will be carried out through courses, apprenticeship field studies, research, and writing, and will lead to either the A.M.T. or Master of Education degree.
Keppel's views on the new program parallel Conant's appeal of 1944 for a "truce among educators," Conant declared, at that time, that "The necessity for good teaching is so obvious as to require no special emphasis in connection with either general education or education for a career. The problem of recruiting the members of the teaching staff and their adequate training is, however, full of difficulties," he added.
During the past three years, there has been a notable increase in the number of full-time students, while part-time student enrollment has been reduced. This is in line with changing faculty opinion which now believes that the best work can be done with students who devote their full attention to graduate study, rather than those whose time is divided between graduate study and a job of some sort. Recent statistics show that the number of full-time students has risen, between 1948 and 1951, from 99 to 141, whereas the number of part-time students has dropped in the same period from 153 to 129.
The Graduate School of Education is a relatively small school in terms of other teacher-training institutions, but this has no bearing on the extent to which students can got placed in jobs. Last year every graduate in the A.M.T. program was offered a job. Some declined to take jobs. However, because in some instances it required moving to a new locale, and they would rather wait until a job in their area was offered. In the past eight years, over 85 percent of graduates from all three programs have been placed by the School's placement office. The success of graduates who compete for their first job, according to Dana M. Cotton. Director of Placement, is well above the national average.
While it is still too early to pass final judgment upon the Graduate School of Education and its new activities enough can be seen of its program in the past five years to speculate on the School's future. In his annual report last year. President Conant noted the School's progress so far.
Conant Praises School
"To say that the School plans to influence American education through research and the training of a limited number of highly selected students for positions of leadership is by no means enough," he stated. "All Universities of course, have a similar aim . . . What I believe to be of particular significance about the plans of the Faculty of Education is the way in which the Faculty is proceeding with its work.
"It proposes in effect to attract the attention of scholars, particularly in the social sciences to the placed of the public school in our mobile society . . . Even in the few years since the new Dean has guided development the potentialities of the undertaking have been commented on favorably by those familiar with the problems in this field it is essential that capital funds be secured before the temporary financing lapses."
And if it is possible that this can be done, as Conant wisely forces "a distinguished future for this graduate school seems assured."