ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 15, 1996 TAG: 9609160052
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Newport News Daily Press
Virginia's teachers do not receive enough training after they've been on the job, and too many of them are hired without the proper credentials, the president of the state's largest teachers' union said Friday.
Cheri James, the president of the Virginia Education Association, spoke in reaction to the findings of a recent study of the nation's teachers that concludes that teacher hiring practices are ``distressingly ad hoc.'' The national and state education associations support the report's conclusions.
``Just because you have a degree in education does not mean you can come into a classroom and teach,'' said James, a former high school math teacher in Richmond. ``We can't just continue to put warm bodies in the classroom.''
State education officials don't want to comment on the study until after they've read it, said Margaret Roberts, director of community relations for the state Department of Education. But Roberts said many of the findings appear to be based on data from 1991, ``and we feel like we've come a long way since then.''
Still, James said, Virginia has a lot of room for improvement.
For example:
*The state no longer has the personnel to monitor the colleges that train teachers. Unlike many other states, Virginia has no board that mandates training and minimum standards for teachers. The state Advisory Board for Teacher Education and Licensure can only advise local school districts.
*Virginia is spending only $75,000 this year toward national certification training for the state's teachers, who say this training makes them better teachers. Some states, including North Carolina, spend 10 times that amount or more per year.
*The state Department of Education grants waivers, called provisional licenses, that allow new teachers to teach for three years without being certified. The study reported that 15.4 percent of all new teachers in Virginia during the 1991-92 school year were unlicensed. And James said that she expects Virginia's percentage is higher now because the enrollment has grown since then, as has the pressure on local school districts to hire teachers. Roberts said only about 5 percent of new teachers in Virginia receive provisional licenses.
``We think provisional licenses are a good thing,'' Roberts said. ``Suppose you had a NASA physicist who retires and wants to teach. A local school district could hire him to teach high school physics. Obviously he knows the subject.'' But that individual may not be a good teacher, she said.
The national study, released Thursday by a commission of governors, university presidents, teachers and business executives, found that about one of four high school teachers lacks college training in the subject they teach; that nearly 40 percent of math teachers are not fully qualified; that 500 of the 1,200 colleges nationwide that have education schools lack accreditation; and that three of 10 teachers quit within five years.
Local school officials and teachers' union officers had not read the study's findings as of Friday afternoon and did not want to comment on it. But they noted that they are doing something about teacher performance.
Newport News school officials are developing a new way to evaluate how teachers do their jobs and help them do it better.
Hampton has begun a program to support new teachers by providing them with mentors. James said the study was released at an opportune time. School enrollment in Virginia is growing, and there is the temptation to hire teachers who may not be certified to teach.
``We hope the study will make school districts think twice about that,'' she said.
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