The CSU MTEP Newsletter will serve as a vehicle to keep CSU MTE-Partnership sites informed of CSU and APLU MTE-Partnership events and opportunities, as well as to share our statewide work related to Secondary Mathematics Teacher Preparation.

Vol. 15, No. 1 - Inaugural Issue!
April 8, 2015

Table of Contents

1. Mark your calendars / Reminders
2. June APLU MTE-Partnership national meeting in Fullerton, CA
3. CSU Measures group report
4. CSU team reports
5. APLU MTE-Partnership updates
6. RAC updates

1. Mark your Calendars / Reminders

• April 17, 2015 - campus leaders nominate attendees for the Fourth Annual APLU MTE-Partnership Conference; survey sent by Gary Martin via SurveyMonkey on April 1.
• April 20, 2015 - campus leaders respond to a survey regarding SMPP capstone classes, sent by Brian R Lawler on April 6 on behalf of the CSU MTEP Measures Group. 
• June 22-24, 2015 - Fourth Annual APLU MTE-Partnership Conference, Fullerton CA. The conference will begin at 1:00 pm on June 22 and end at 12:00 pm on June 24.
• October, 2015 - CSU MTEP Convening, likely at a CSU in northern CA.

2. June APLU MTE-Partnership national meeting in Fullerton, CA

The APLU Mathematics Teacher Education Partnership (MTE-Partnership) provides a coordinated research, development, and implementation effort for secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs to promote research and best practices in the field.The group was convened by APLU’s Science and Mathematics Teaching Imperative (SMTI) in early 2012 and presently includes 101 universities, university systems, and community colleges and 142 K-12 schools and school districts across 30 states to work collaboratively to transform secondary mathematics teacher preparation.

The Partnership seeks to achieve a range of outcomes as a result of this project, including (1) increased number of candidates produced, (2) improved quality of candidates, (3) improved performance by students in beginning college mathematics, and (4) promising interventions to improve secondary mathematics teacher preparation and introductory college mathematics courses that can be scaled to a growing number of institutions over time.

This conference will highlight the progress of the national Partnership and provide opportunities for local teams to become further engaged in the core work of their Research Action Cluster (RAC). Each RAC will also be inviting additional teams to become involved in extended aspects of their work; you will also get a preview of a future new RAC on new teacher retention and induction; and be updated on progress on measures being developed to track the progress of the MTE-Partnership.

This conference will be an important opportunity for the 22 campuses of the CSU-MTEP community to become more fully engaged in the Partnership. The conference will begin at 1:00 pm on June 22 and end at 12:00 pm on June 24. A draft agenda can be viewed here.

Special Note: Campus Leads - Your campus may nominate up to two representatives to attend. Your campus lead has received an email with a link through which you can submit your nominees and their contact information. Respond by Friday, April 17, 2015 to be considered.  

3. CSU Measures group report

The CSU MTE-Partnership Measures Group was formed with the initial charge to explicate what a well-prepared new secondary mathematics teacher completing a CSU program should know and be able to do, and to explore measures that support that definition. 

The Measures Group had a first meeting on January 30, 2015, to launch its efforts. The goal for the work day was to generate a set of faculty-driven ideas about the sort of measures that would provide us, both as individual programs and collectively as a system, with actionable insight into the outcomes of our preparation efforts at both the undergraduate and post-baccalaureate levels.

An initial discussion of what constituted a well-prepared secondary mathematics teacher, led to the following list of attributes. A CSU credentialed teacher enters the profession with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions needed to

• productively engage all students in mathematical thinking and learning reflective of current standards,
• collaborate with colleagues in the design and revision of instructional materials based on student outcomes, and
• engage in ongoing learning that builds on initial preparation to further develop knowledge of mathematics for teaching and proficiency with research-based pedagogical practices.

The specific characteristics of the TSM to be developed by the preparation program can be grouped into the following categories (not hierarchically ordered):

• Knowledge of Students
• Knowledge of Mathematics Content (including PCK/MKT) and Mathematical Practices
• Pedagogical Skills of Designing, Implementing, and Assessing Instructional Activities
• Pedagogical Skills for Attending to Equity, Diversity, and Participation in Mathematical Discourse
• Dispositions and Beliefs about Students
• Dispositions and Beliefs about Mathematics
• Dispositions and Beliefs about the Teaching Profession

Five areas to measure candidate progress/outcomes were identified as having high potential for informing our understanding of the impact of teacher preparation efforts at both the undergraduate and post-baccalaureate levels. Sub-groups were formed around four of these. 

1. Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching 
2. Beliefs and Attitudes toward Mathematics
3. Classroom Practices: Protocol for Candidate Observations
4. Dispositions, Skills, Practices: Completer Exit Survey
5. Perceptions of Candidate Knowledge and Practices in Clinical Placement: Survey of Secondary Students [to be assigned]

During Spring 2015, each of the first four subgroups are investigating instruments to assess these outcomes. The CSU MTEP Measures Group will meet again in just prior to or after the APLU MTE-Partnership national meeting in Fullerton, CA, June 22-24, 2015.

Special Note: Campus Leads - Please do not forget to complete the capstone course survey by the MKT subcommittee available at http://ow.ly/LcmFG. They request this be completed by April 20, 2015.

4. CSU team reports - focus on Clinical Practice

Several CSUs have begun activity in the Clinical Practice RAC. This RAC has three branches, Co-teaching, Triad (one teacher with two student teachers), and an early field experience.

CSU Chico and CSU Sacramento have paired and are actively participating in the first branch, co-teaching/co-planning. Jennifer Oloff-Lewis (Chico) and Stephanie Biagetti (Sacramento), team representatives, met with the RAC in Denver on August 1, 2014 and began implementing the structures with one master-student teacher pair at each site during Fall 2014, ensuring collection of data agreed upon by the RAC community via pre- and post-surveys. This commitment to a common measurement, rapid prototype and interventions which proceed as part of a shared network of improvement "enable the networked community to learn fast, fail fast and improve fast."

Prior to the Denver meeting, this branch of the Clinical Practice RAC met via video conference on three additional occasions to polish the data collections instruments, protocols, and plans for analysis. Since this early Fall preparation, the Chico-Sac State team has also contributed to the writing of a Noyce Grant to more fully fund this project to improve the clinical experiences for preservice teachers. During summer 2015, they will begin data analysis, as well as submit proposals for conference presentations at NCTM and AERA this summer based on initial findings.

Cal Poly Pomona, Cal Poly SLO, CSUCI, and CSULA are in the process of building necessary relationships with school district partners to ramp up to full participation in the RAC. CSULA looks to utilize a residency structure that is set to begin in Fall 2016 to learn from and contribute to the Clinical Practice RAC. Like CSULA, Cal Poly Pomona is amid a conversion from a quarter to a semester system, creating opportunities due to significant changes to the credential program.

CSUCI is in a similar "early stages" state in that while they have strong district partnerships, they are now utilizing a recently awarded "Next Generation of Educators" grant to provide professional development for preservice and mentor teachers, along with mathematics faculty, toward efforts to improve the clinical experience for our future secondary mathematics teachers.

Like most CSU campuses, these sites are now moving beyond the awareness and understanding stages of the MTE-Partnership RACs and beginning to build the necessary relationships and structures to fully join the national network of teams working to improve the clinical component of improving secondary mathematics teacher preparation.

5. APLU MTE-Partnership updates

• Several RACs are poised to begin requesting feedback on products and resources including early field testing. More information will be announced at the June conference.
• The new RAC on retaining our graduates in the profession will also be formally announced at the June conference.
• The number of colleges and universities has jumped to over 100 with nearly 150 K-12 school or district partners. 

6. RAC updates

Please reach out to your national RAC leaders to ask how you might become more involved.

• MODULE(S)^2 - has identified writing teams to finalize usable, unit-long modules for those who teach mathematics courses for prospective mathematics teachers, in the areas of transformational geometry, modeling, and statistics (an algebra module is less far along). At present, geometry modules are being piloted for the second time and the statistics and modeling groups each have two modules in the initial stages. If you would like to be more involved with the work of these groups please contact the first person listed under the desired topic. Lead: Emina Alibegovic, University of Utah. 
  • geometry: Emina Alibegovic and Alyson Lischka
  • statistics: Jeremy Strayer and Joyce Smart
  • modeling: Brynja Kohler and Adam Poetzl
  • algebra: Mike Mays and Paul Kennedy
• Clinical Experiences - is developing innovative models for clinical experiences that are aligned with college- and career-ready standards. Presently, they are developing three models: (a) Activity modules for methods courses that include early field experiences; (b) a Paired-placement student teaching model in which two student teachers are placed with one mentor teacher; and (c) a Co-planning/co-teaching student teaching model which emphasizes collaborative teaching. The group may be inviting extended piloting of these structures in the coming year. Several members of this RAC will attend the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Learning Lab starting in April 2015; this will enable them to receive coaching in their understanding and application of the NIC (networked improvement community) model. Lead: Marilyn Strutchens, Auburn University.

• MATH (Marketing to Attract Teaching Hopefuls) - has been working on approaches to improve the recruitment of secondary mathematics teacher candidates. In addition to creating and collecting examples of recruitment strategies, tactics, and products utilized at member sites, the RAC is creating a teacher recruitment implementation guide that addresses nine components for developing and managing a teacher recruitment campaign. These examples and guides are ready for others to use, test, and provide feedback. Lead: Ed Dickey, University of South Carolina.

• Active Learning - is focusing on improving instruction in precalculus and calculus as a way to retain and better prepare more students in secondary mathematics as well as other STEM majors. Some materials have been developed to support RAC members and other to pilot new instructional approaches, as well as begin exploring the institutional changes necessary. Lead: David Webb, University of Colorado.

• Knowledge-for-Teaching-Mathematics Tasks (KTMT) - is currently exploring options to relaunch its work to create valid and reliable assessments that align with the specific recommendations in METII. Lead: Bob Ronau, University of Cincinnati.