2010-2012 cohort theme: Teaching Toward a Better World: Embracing the Challenges

Teaching is a service that changes students’ lives. However, teaching in today’s public schools can be a daunting task, given the massive scope of a teacher’s responsibility and impact on others. The greatest strength of K–12 schools is the remarkable teachers who create effective learning environments for their students despite the growing number of challenges with which they are confronted. These challenges during times of turmoil and change give us the impetus to look within ourselves and at the world once more in order to more fully recognize the values and aspirations that will help us prepare children and youth to participate in the world. Hope for a better society is—more than ever—dependent on good education. The time is right to carefully consider and act on our deepest educational values.

Evergreen’s MIT program is inspired by the belief that the foundation of learning in a democracy should be to understand and respond to an individual’s talents, interests and needs while supporting the interests and needs of the community. Genuine caring for the all-around welfare of others is embraced as a guiding educational value in our program as we prepare teachers to facilitate academic learning, teach for social justice, and prepare students to live in a democracy. We take seriously the charge from the state of Washington to prepare highly competent teachers, able to use what they know about learning, development, communication and diverse learners to inform their teaching, and place learning in a social context.

This demanding program will prepare you as a future teacher to engage in reflective practice in order to support the learning of diverse students. You will learn what is involved in supporting the development of students’ knowledge and skills in the specific area(s) you plan to teach. In your work with children and youth, you will learn to take into account cognitive, social and emotional development, cultural context, motivation and recent research on teaching and learning. You will also learn how to adapt, create and implement interdisciplinary curriculum that:

• provides all students with an equitable opportunity to gain access to the tools they need for empowerment in the world in which they live;
• builds on the assets and interests of students and their communities;
• conceives of teaching and learning in relation to a world shared with diverse populations with diverse needs and aspirations.

If you are eager to become a caring, competent, purposeful and thoughtful teacher, and you are willing to examine both yourself and the existing structures of schooling in order to create learning environments that are inclusive of and responsive to the needs of all students, then we encourage you to apply. We also urge you to consider the need for math, science, English language learners (ELL), and special education teachers. We invite people who will work together with their Evergreen colleagues and faculty to create a highly supportive environment in which to meet the high expectations of this program.

We seek candidates who: (1) have strong critical reading and writing skills; (2) both actively seek out and are open to critical, constructive feedback; (3) have a genuine interest in their own intellectual and emotional growth; (4) are invested in serving the communities where they will teach; and, of course, (5) care about the well-being and development of children and youth.

Monday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
9am-12pm All cohort 1-3pm Seminars	9am-1pm All cohort	K–12 schools: start of teacher’s workday and generally ending at noon (ending times will vary according to school schedules)	9am-1pm All cohort

In addition to these scheduled times, students should anticipate studying approximately 2-3 hours for every credit hour received. For 16 credits this works out to between 32 and 48 hours per week of preparation in addition to regularly scheduled class time.

Cohort Faculty

My aspiration as a teacher educator is to help support our Master in Teaching candidates in becoming remarkable teachers: able to remember the noble purpose of schooling, having clarity of purpose, and possessing abundant pedagogical knowledge and skill. The philosophy and structure of Evergreen’s MIT Program well supports our unique and very effective approach to preparing teachers. After seven years of involvement with the MIT program, I am more than ever convinced that our highly collaborative and interdisciplinary approach supports the development of superb teachers who are well prepared to meet the needs of their future students.

My own K–12 public school teaching experience includes eleven years of working in a variety of settings: in a large and diverse high school, in a small rural junior-senior high school, and in a K–12 alternative school. My interest in instructional planning and the preparation of teachers eventually led me to earn a degree in instructional design and subsequently to fifteen years of full time involvement in teacher education. Over the past few years I have actively pursued an increasing interest in counseling psychology, now recognizing the important place of psychological health alongside content knowledge, methodological expertise, and planning skills in the all around success of teachers. My current areas of interest include the systematic and creative design of instruction and the psychological health of teachers.

Scott Coleman, B.S., Biology, State University of New York Brockport, 1973; M.A., Education, San Diego State University, 1980; Ph.D., Indiana University, 1989; M.A., Counseling Psychology, California Institute of Integral Studies, 2009. MIT director 2001-2006, taught full time in MIT 2006-2008.

Other Faculty - Anita and Scott will be joined by K–12 practitioners and other MIT faculty throughout the two-year program.

 

I taught high school math, physics and chemistry in Kenya in the mid-80s and then middle school math for 8 years in north Seattle. My students were brilliant, passionate, caring and playful young people. Their lives, stories and energies bless my work with pre-service and in-service teachers. I believe that all children deserve a powerful, rigorous, engaging curriculum that reflects their interests and passions while broadening their horizons.

Children seem to naturally care about justice. As we grow and acculturate into our society, we often learn to dismiss injustice as normal. While education offers great hope for disrupting injustice, it often recreates it. Americans view mathematical ability as genetic and unchangeable and math content as difficult; neither idea is well founded. Yet we often use these beliefs to normalize the pedagogy of poverty. We also often hold a narrow view of learning. School education is one place to learn among many. Students come to school already well educated to function successfully in their home environments. As teachers, we need to learn to draw from and build on students’ knowledge.

I am committed to supporting pre-service teachers’ knowledge, passions, and sense of justice to learn how to create equitable and powerful learning experiences for all of the students they encounter. Becoming a teacher who works for social justice demands intense study and a willingness to use mistakes and failures as learning experiences. Becoming an effective teacher is a lifelong process, not one that is completed with a teaching certificate or a Ph.D. If MIT candidates will commit to lifelong learning to benefit all students, I will commit my energy, compassion, knowledge and experience to their success. My areas of interest include students learning mathematics, teachers learning to teach mathematics, and teaching math for social justice.

Anita Lenges, B.A., Mathematics & Anthropology, University of Washington, 1986; Washington State Teaching Certificate, 1990; M.Ed. Mathematics Education and Teacher Leadership, University of Washington, 1994; Ph.D. Curriculum and Instruction, University of Washington, 2004. Post-doctoral study on teacher preparation for teaching in diverse, urban schools, 2005. Taught MIT 2005-2007, Colonialism and Decolonization 2007-2008, M.Ed. and Evergreen Center for Educational Leadership 2008-2009.