Appetizer

Every weekday morning for approximately nine months of the year, thousands of American adults get up and spend their day standing in front of a room full of children. Apart from teaching children the basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, they also correct behavioral problems, offer advice and serve as role models. While this job is multi-faceted and very important to the success of society, it doesn’t have a fancy job title or description; instead, it goes by a simple name that even the smallest child can lisp out: teacher.

No one would deny the key role a teacher plays in the proper development of a child. No one would deny that a teacher must be well equipped to pass on knowledge to the next generation. However, some would adamantly deny that today’s teachers are receiving adequate training on how to pass along the all important basic skills that children are supposed to learn in school.

Much debate swirls around the topic of education schools and the processes and procedures they use to certify America’s teachers. People on both sides of the political spectrum have acknowledged that many education courses are superficial and are not effectively training teachers in the subjects they will have to teach to their students. Despite this agreement, many disagree over how to effectively certify truly qualified teachers. Some push for alternative certification, a process which would encourage highly academic adults with degrees in areas such as math and science to teach in those respective areas without having to take numerous classes on child development and education philosophies. Others claim that this diminishes teacher certification standards and throws uncertified teachers into situations for which they are highly unprepared.

This section seeks to explain the history of teacher certification and the current content being taught in education schools. This section will also focus a great deal on the ideas behind alternative teacher certification, its effectiveness, and the lengths to which it has been implemented in today’s public classrooms.