Bard College’s Master of Arts in Teaching Program wins $774,213 Federal Grant from The Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.—The Bard College Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program has been awarded a $774,213 grant from the U.S. Department of Education’s Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) Comprehensive Program. The grant will fund 75 percent of the costs of Bard MAT’s three-year project, Preparing Teachers for These Times: Context Specific Teacher Education Across the Domains, a model for teacher preparation that addresses a national need to improve learning and close the achievement gap for all students. The FIPSE program supports and disseminates innovative reform projects that promise to be models for improving the quality of postsecondary education and increasing student access.

Preparing Teachers for These Times (PT3) is an innovative and easily replicable model for teacher preparation pioneered by the MAT Program. Teacher quality is the most significant factor in student achievement. Recent recommendations by the National Research Council (NRC, 2010) regarding teacher preparation and assessment parallel the foundational principles of Bard’s MAT Program, which are to integrate the principal strands of teacher education: advanced study in a discipline, critical studies in areas of education, and a model of clinical practice that responds effectively to a full range of student needs, especially for underserved populations. PT3 will not only develop and demonstrate the effectiveness of this singular approach—which integrates advanced disciplinary and educational studies with yearlong residencies in high-needs schools currently in high-poverty rural and urban areas—but will also demonstrate and assess how the integration of a teacher education program and a public school on a common campus is a cost-effective, replicable model that raises middle school and high school student outcomes by increasing teacher effectiveness and retention. An experienced evaluation team will conduct comparative studies across sites, facilitating replication efforts by other institutions of higher education partnering with high-needs public schools in rural or urban settings. This, ultimately, is the vision for the future of teacher education that Bard MAT hopes to disseminate nationally through its PT3 model. Every school has the potential to be a satellite campus for a college teacher education program. By 2013, PT3 will raise student achievement in high-needs schools and provide the necessary data and design for replication of this teacher education model nationwide.

About the Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program at Bard College

The Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program, founded in 2003, responds to an urgent need for change in public education. Bard’s MAT Program engages students, faculty, and public school teachers in advancing the best ideas about teacher preparation and the improvement of secondary and postsecondary education. It offers one-year MAT. programs at its campuses in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York City, and Delano, California. Bard MAT also offers a two-year MAT. program, a five-year combined program leading to the bachelor of arts and master of arts in teaching degrees to Bard undergraduates at its Annandale-on-Hudson campus. In partnership with the Bard Center for Environmental Policy, students may apply for a two-year dual degree program (master of science in environmental policy and master of arts in teaching). All programs of study include integrated course work, student teaching, and independent research, and upon satisfactory completion of these programs, MAT graduates receive a master of arts in teaching degree and a New York State Initial Certificate in Adolescent Education (grades 7-12) in one of four areas: English, mathematics, biology, and history.

For more information about Bard’s MAT Program, please call 845-758-7145, e-mail [email protected], or visit www.bard.edu/mat.

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(10/7/10)

Website: https://www.bard.edu/mat

This event was last updated on 12-20-2011

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