JOHNSON CITY – (Jan. 28, 2020) East Tennessee State University’s undergraduate elementary teacher preparation program has been named one of the top in the country by the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), a nonpartisan, not-for-profit research and policy organization, for its strong commitment to evidence-based reading instruction.
This month, NCTQ released its “2020 Teacher Prep Review: Program Performance in Early Reading Instruction,” which finds significant progress on the science of reading instruction in teacher preparation. For the first time since NCTQ began publishing ratings in the 2013 Teacher Prep Review, 51% of the over 1,000 evaluated traditional elementary teacher preparation programs earned an A or B grade for their coverage of the key components of the science of reading, up from just 35% seven years ago.
ETSU is one of only 15 undergraduate elementary programs that earned an A+ due to exemplary coursework, and serves as a model of excellence for others. These top-performing programs provide the following for each of the five essential components of reading:
- Explicit and repeated instruction on each component;
- Support for instruction with high-quality textbooks that accurately detail established principles of scientifically-based reading practices; and
- Opportunities for teacher candidates to demonstrate mastery through in-class assignments, tests, and instructional practice.
We have a rich history of strong literacy teaching steeped in evidence-based practices
as demonstrated not only by NCTQ, but also our candidates’ evaluation on edTPA and
other assessment measures.
Now in its fourth edition, the Teacher Prep Review assigns a team of literacy experts
to examine every course a program requires in early reading, looking at the planned
topics to be covered in each class, readings, assignments, practice opportunities,
and tests, as well as rating the quality of the textbooks used in each course.
Experts look for clear evidence of dedicated course time as well as measures where aspiring teachers must demonstrate their knowledge of the five key components of the science of reading: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. For more information about ETSU’s teacher preparation programs, visit https://www.etsu.edu/coe/cuai/default.php.
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