Middle School Teacher Preparation: North
Carolina
Delivering Well Prepared Teachers Policy
Analysis of North Carolina's policies
North Carolina requires a middle-grades (6-9) certificate for all middle school teachers. The state clearly requires that candidates must complete a teacher preparation program, but it is somewhat more ambiguous regarding coursework requirements. Secondary teachers may also teach the middle grades.
Middle school teachers in North Carolina are required to pass a single-subject Praxis II content test; a general content knowledge test is not an option. However, the state allows teachers to fulfill this testing requirement in their second year of teaching, provided they attempt to pass the assessments during their first year.
Commendably, North Carolina does not offer a K-8 generalist license.
North Carolina's assessment for middle school English teachers, the Praxis II Middle School English Language Arts (5047) test, includes some of the instructional shifts toward building content knowledge and vocabulary through careful reading of informational and literary texts associated with the state's college- and career-readiness standards for students. However, the state allows teachers to fulfill this testing requirement in their second year of teaching, provided they attempt to pass the assessments during their first year.
North Carolina's rubric for teacher candidate evaluation addresses incorporating literacy into all content areas. It requires middle school teachers to "incorporate literacy instruction within the content area or discipline," and to be ranked proficient, candidates must be able to "integrate effective literacy instruction throughout the curriculum and across content areas to enhance students' learning."
Regarding struggling readers, North Carolina's middle school English content test requires that a teacher be able to group students and
differentiate instruction. However, it does not specifically address the
ability either to identify struggling readers or provide
appropriate intervention.
Recommendations for North Carolina
Require content testing in all core areas prior to entering the classroom.
North Carolina should require subject-matter testing for all middle school teacher candidates in every core academic area they intend to teach as a condition of initial licensure. To ensure meaningful middle school content tests, the state should set its passing scores to reflect high levels of performance.
Encourage middle school teachers licensed to teach multiple subjects to earn two subject-matter minors.
This would allow candidates to gain sufficient knowledge to pass state licensing tests, and it would increase schools' staffing flexibility. However, middle school candidates in North Carolina who intend to teach a single subject should earn a major in that area.
Close the loophole that allows teachers to add middle-grade levels to an existing license without demonstrating content knowledge.
North Carolina allows teachers with an existing license to add a teaching area with either coursework or a passing score on a content test. The state is urged to require that all teachers who add the middle-grade levels to their certificates pass a rigorous subject-matter test to ensure content knowledge of all subject areas before they are allowed in the classroom.
Ensure that middle school teachers are prepared to meet the instructional requirements of college- and career-readiness standards
for students.
Incorporate informational text of increasing complexity into classroom instruction.
Although
North Carolina's English Language Arts content test for middle school
teachers addresses informational texts, the state should strengthen its
policy and ensure that teachers are able to challenge students with
texts of increasing complexity—as a condition of initial licensure.
Support struggling readers.
North Carolina should
articulate more specific requirements ensuring that middle school
teachers are prepared to intervene and support students who are
struggling. While college- and career-readiness standards will increase
the need for all middle school teachers to be able to help struggling
readers to comprehend grade-level material, training for English
language arts teachers in particular must emphasize identification and
remediation of reading deficiencies.
State response to our analysis
North Carolina recognized the factual accuracy of this analysis.
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North Carolina
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Delivering Well Prepared Teachers
- Admission into Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Reading Instruction
- Elementary Teacher Preparation in Mathematics
- Early Childhood
- Middle School Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation
- Secondary Teacher Preparation in Science and Social Studies
- Special Education Teacher Preparation
- Special Education Preparation in Reading
- Assessing Professional Knowledge
- Student Teaching
- Teacher Preparation Program Accountability
Expanding the Pool of Teachers
Identifying Effective Teachers
- State Data Systems
- Evaluation of Effectiveness
- Frequency of Evaluations
- Tenure
- Licensure Advancement
- Equitable Distribution
Retaining Effective Teachers
Exiting Ineffective Teachers
Pensions
Research rationale
States must
differentiate middle school teacher preparation from that of elementary
teachers.
Middle school grades are critical years of schooling. It is
in these years that far too many students fall through the cracks. However,
requirements for the preparation and licensure of middle school teachers are
among the weakest state policies. Too many states fail to distinguish the
knowledge and skills needed by middle school teachers from those needed by an
elementary teacher. Whether teaching a single subject in a departmentalized
setting or teaching multiple subjects in a self-contained setting, middle
school teachers must be able to teach significantly more advanced content than
elementary teachers do. The notion that someone should be identically prepared
to teach first grade or eighth grade mathematics seems ridiculous, but states
that license teachers on a K-8 generalist certificate essentially endorse this
idea.
College- and career-readiness standards require significant shifts in literacy instruction.
College- and career-readiness standards for K-12 students adopted by nearly all states require from teachers a different focus on literacy integrated into all subject areas. The standards demand that teachers are prepared to bring complex text and academic language into regular use, emphasize the use of evidence from informational and literary texts and build knowledge and vocabulary through content-rich text. While most states have not ignored teachers' need for training and professional development related to these instructional shifts, few states have attended to the parallel need to align teacher competencies and requirements for teacher preparation so that new teachers will enter the classroom ready to help students meet the expectations of these standards. Because middle school teachers in most states can be licensed either to be multi-subject teachers or generalists, middle school teachers need specialized preparation. Particularly for single subject teachers of areas other than English language arts, these instructional shifts may be especially acute.
Middle School Teacher Preparation: Supporting Research
A
report published by the National Mathematics Advisory Panel (NMAP) concludes
that a teacher's knowledge of math makes a difference in student achievement. U.S.
Department of Education. Foundations for Success: The Final Report of the National Mathematics Advisory Panel.
Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Education (2008).
For
additional research on the importance of subject matter knowledge, see T. Dee and S. Cohodes, "Out-of-Field Teachers and Student Achievement: Evidence from Matched-Pairs Comparisons." Public
Finance Review, Volume 36, No. 1, January 2008, pp. 7-32; B.
Chaney, "Student outcomes and the professional preparation of eighth-grade teachers in science and mathematics," in NSF/NELS:88 Teacher transcript analysis, 1995, ERIC, ED389530, 112 p.; H. Wenglinsky, How Teaching Matters: Bringing the Classroom Back Into Discussions of Teacher Quality (Princeton, NJ:
Educational Testing Service, 2000).
For
information on the "ceiling effect," see D. Goldhaber and D. Brewer,
"When should we reward degrees for teachers?" in Phi Delta
Kappan, Volume 80, No. 2, October 1998, pp. 134, 136-138.
For an extensive summary of the research base supporting the instructional shifts associated with college- and career-readiness standards, see "Research Supporting the Common Core ELA Literacy Shifts and Standards" available from Student Achievement Partners.