TEAM and Our Qualified Teachers

by Lynn K. McMullin

In late August, we introduced our newest teachers in a webpage photo album called “Welcome New Staff.”  (You can find it below the BLOG is you missed it.)  Since, I am fresh from a meeting in Hartford about the new TEAM program for beginning teachers, I thought I’d provide some information about the paces we put our new teachers through to ensure they are the best teachers they can be.


First of all, in Canton we only hire certified teachers (or teachers whose certification is immediately pending because, perhaps, they have moved to Connecticut from another state.)  As you can see from the photo album, most of our new hires already have their Master’s degrees. Others are enrolled in a graduate program and are well on their way to an advanced degree.


All beginning teachers have 3-year Initial Certificates. This means they have successfully complete a state-approved education program at an accredited college or university; they have passed the Praxis I Skills Tests (math, reading, and writing); and passed the Praxis II Subject-Knowledge Tests, such as in Elementary Education or French or Biology.  Once hired in a school district, teachers with initial certifications now need to complete TEAM (which I tell you more about below) in order to move on in their careers.


The next level is the Provisional Certificate, which is valid for 8 years and requires 30 months of successful teaching experience, as well as 30 semester hours (10 courses) of credit beyond the bachelor’s degree at an accredited college or university.  After 2016, those credit hours can only be graduate level courses and cannot be in the pursuit of another bachelor's.


Next, the teacher seeks a Professional Certificate, which is valid for five years. It requires 30 additional months of successful experience and 9 additional CEU’s (Continuing Education Units).  Each CEU is equal to 10 hours of additional training, so a total of 90 hours of professional development are required for a teacher to retain certification.


Some beginning teachers come to us through ARC, or Alternate Route to Certification, which allows qualified, motivated adults to change career paths.  These are individuals with college degrees and years of experience in a relevant profession who are willing to enter an intense teacher training program.

TEAM is Connecticut's Teacher Education and Mentoring Program

TEAM is an induction program which pairs beginning teachers with trained mentors and, step-by-step, works them through five, 10-week modules. The difference between this experience and their eight to 10 weeks of student-teaching in college is enormous. In TEAM, they are immersed in their own classrooms, they are expected to set very specific learning goals for themselves, to reflect on their daily classroom performance and how they are improving and developing as teachers, and to track student achievement in specific impact statements.

The TEAM modules are: Classroom Environment, Planning for Active Learning, Instruction for Active Learning, Assessment for Learning, and Professional Responsibilities. The phrase “for active learning” in these modules refers to the idea that the new teachers must concentrate more on what their students are doing than on what they are doing.  New teachers are expected to be coaches of learning not lecturers or imparters of knowledge.  Or in edu-speak -- they are to become a “guide on the side’ not a ‘sage on the stage.’

TEAM is a brand new state program, so as I mentioned to one of our administrators today, we are flying the plane while we are building it.  We have mentors in various stages of training, we have the draft of brand new 3-year District TEAM Plan in the hands of a brand new, though eager committee.  We’re still trying to iron out some glitches in the data, so that our new teachers are in the correct schools and can be paired with the correct mentors in State’s new on-line system.  I was told yesterday, that the request for data corrections is down to only 470 this week. 

Yet, I must say, none of this is scary.  In fact it is rather exciting!  The three most positive signs of success are: 1.) the new TEAM modules have a heavy emphasis on mentoring, in-class coaching, and co-teaching, a practice well supported by research; 2.) the in-house committee approach for scoring our beginning teacher’s reflections about the modules gives Canton a great deal of control over induction, and 3.) the happy coincidence that Canton’s five new Teacher Evaluation Rubrics align with the State’s five modules (we must have used the same research!)

I’m sharing this information with you as reassurance that we have hired the best teachers and are working even harder now to ensure their success.  When new teachers leave the profession, they generally do so in the first two years out of frustration, because getting started in teaching is very, very difficult and they have felt alone and unsupported.   We’re doing everything we can to create a supportive community that retains the fabulous people we have hired.

An aside:
** By the way, athletic coaches are required to have certifications, too.  In fact, this July, legislation was passed that in addition to other required courses, coaches must complete a training course regarding concussions and head injuries and must update that training every five years.  Only courses approved by the Connecticut State Board of Education qualify for this certification.