The Need Why is the UW-Whitewater Teacher Residency Program needed?

The Need Many schools in Wisconsin are having difficulty recruiting and maintaining qualified teachers. This is especially a concern in rural school districts. As a result, DPI issued 2,659 one year licenses during the 2016-2017 school year. The UWW College of Education and Professional studies received over 300 inquiries from Mid-May 2018 to Mid-August 2018 from individuals with a bachelors degree who were seeking a different avenue, other than the college's traditional program, for earning their teaching license.

The Candidates a bachelor's degree in the content area in which they seek licensure a 2.75 or higher GPA on all credits from all institutions seeking licensure in a secondary education content area have (or be willing to establish) a connection to a rural school district

The Program In order to transform teaching and learning in Wisconsin, we propose a practice-based teacher residency program. Our hypothesis is that teacher training and development must mirror the kinds of learning and outcomes we want to see in our schools. If we want our children and youth to be creative problem solvers, teacher preparation and development must foster those same skills and abilities in our future teachers. Thus we will draw on current findings in research on teacher education to create a program that will enable teachers to meet the challenges of our times.

The Program The UW-Whitewater AmeriCorps Teacher Residency Program (TRP) is an inquiry-based teacher education program that leads to teacher licensure and also addresses teacher shortage areas in rural districts. The program’s mission is to find individuals already living and invested in rural communities who hold a bachelor’s degree, and want to teach in these districts. As a community of adult learners, the members will engage in online and face-to-face instructional experiences as they learn to:  • effectively assess learners to guide instruction • practice evidence informed teaching • understand teaching as an inquiry-based profession • build inclusive classrooms • develop further mastery in their particular teaching content • gain knowledge through practice-based instruction

The Program The UWW TRP will provide a 15-month non-credit-bearing licensure program of study that involves online and face-to-face instruction during the initial summer, through the residency year (when residents will co-teach full-time), and in the following summer. Upon completion of this program, residency members will earn a Wisconsin teaching license in their targeted area.

The Program divided into six inquiries with a series of modules the program contains three types of modules: Knowledge Building, Application and Implementation each module ranges from 5 to 15 hours of learning hours modules may contain: • readings, PowerPoints, videos, etc. • module discussion question(s) • reflection topic(s) • online quizzes

Partnerships The Teacher Residency Program is looking to partner with rural Wisconsin school districts to address the teacher shortage in key licensure area. In this first year of the program, TRP will be targeting secondary licensures.  Through this partnership, teacher and administrators in rural school districts will mentor residency members, while UW-Whitewater provides them with the essential knowledge needed to be an effective teacher.  District administrators, principals and teachers may already know individuals in their community who would make great teachers in their schools. Maybe they are instructional aides, dedicated family volunteers or community leaders. Recommend these local individuals to the UW-W Teacher Residency Program Coordinator, and together we can prepare them to be teachers in their home communities.

Partner Schools By teaming up with UW-Whitewater’s Teacher Residency Program, you would be a Partner School. As a partner school, you would be helping to grow your own local talent into the future teachers in your own schools. 

Partner Schools As a TRP Partner School you will... • help target potential individuals to refer to the Teacher Residency Program. • partner a residency member with a cooperating teacher for an academic year. • welcome the residency member into the school community. • mentor the residency member by providing needed support to become an effective teacher. • adhere to the AmeriCorps guiding principles and expectations. • provide the residency member with a yearly living allowance.

Partner Schools UW-Whitewater will... • provide residency members with a thorough study of the principles of teaching. • support and build the relationships between the residency members, their cooperating teachers, school administrators and the UWW Teacher Residency Program. • conduct virtual observations of each residency member.

For more information contact: Michael Truman Program Coordinator: UW-Whitewater Teacher Residency Program trumanml15@uww.edu Dr. Robin Fox Interim Dean College of Education and Professional Studies foxr@uww.edu