The New Academic Year 2007-2008
Welcome Back, Arts & Science Colleagues!
By Mary Brabeck, Ph.D.
Welcome back, all colleagues in Arts and Sciences who teach the courses that help teachers become high quality educators! I believe that high quality teachers need to love the kids they teach, and to love the subject matter they teach. If teachers love the kids, they will strive to be proficient in the latest methods that research shows are effective in teaching each of the diverse learners in their classes. They will acquire skills in structuring instruction to motivate each student to achieve at high levels. They will take the time to find and help address the non-academic barriers to learning (addictions, poverty, violence, etc.) that impede so many from achieving their potential.
If teachers love their subject matter, they will be as curious about learning math, science, music, history, literature, languages, as they want their students to be. Teacher educators need colleagues in Arts and Sciences to partner with us so that teachers develop deep content knowledge, and ways to continue increasing that knowledge.
Talking with Arts and Science colleagues at NYU, I know many of you want to be involved in teacher preparation. Faculty who are parents want excellent teachers for their children and some understand education issues through spouses who are PreK-12 teachers. Some professors see involvement with teachers as a civic responsibility and seek to understand K-12 state standards for their discipline. Some faculty realize that if PreK-12 students are not prepared in higher order math and sciences, if they do not know history or languages, they will not be ready for our universities, and the United States will lose its place in the world economy because of our entrepreneurial invention and discovery.
So welcome back Arts and Science faculty! Together we will prepare the high-quality teachers our students and our nation need and deserve.#
Mary Brabeck is Dean, NYU School of Education.
