Education Law

A Professional School of Education?

Sorry, a little off topic today, but I have spent the better part of the last week in redesign meetings here at the University of Kentucky. We are (re)designing our teacher leadership Master's, our principalship post-master's and our Ed.D. (and Ed.S. and instructional supervisor, etc. ... it's all on the table ... which is both cool and scary). 

Anyway, with everything on the table, I find myself thinking perhaps we should make a professional degree for teachers akin to that of law, medicine, veterinary, dental surgery, etc. It would not be the inital degree, but here in Kentucky the state has mandated that all teachers receive Masters degrees within 10 years of taking their first job. So, every teacher in Kentucky is going to be doing graduate work anyway ... so what about doing that in professional schools? 

Consider this definition from the Council on Education for Public Health:

"A professional degree is one that, based on its learning objectives and types of positions its graduates pursue, prepares students with a broad mastery of the subject matter and methods necessary in a field of practice; it typically requires students to develop the capacity to organize, analyze, interpret and communicate knowledge in an applied manner."

"A research or academic degree program is one that, based on its learning objectives and the paths its graduates follow, prepares students for scholarly careers, particularly in academia and other research settings; it typically prepares students to investigate, acquire, organize, analyze and disseminate new knowledge in a discipline or field of study."

Seems like the former rather than the latter is what teachers need, right? I'm not the first to suggest this. In fact, the Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate has this consideration as one of its central tenets (and UK is a Carnegie Project University) and some of these universities are openly stating it should be considered along similar lines to the J.D. and M.D.  

But, if it is to be a "professional degree" it must come with the benefits of the "professional school." 

For me personally as a professor, the flexibility granted to professional schools is what is most attractive. Living in the law school world and the ed. school world are two totally different experiences. It was not that law was more flexible per say, it was just that flexibility was within reach instead of 6 meetings away, like it is in the education world where there is committee approval after committee approval. For instance, while at SIU I started a J.D./M.E.A. joint degree. On the graduate side I had to do faculty senate meetings and lots of others. On the law side, the Associate Dean said "go" and that was basically it.  

I also like the prestige that comes with professional school degrees. The J.D. is not equal to the Ph.D. in the eyes of academia, but pretty much everywhere else it is. I see no reason the Ed.D. could not serve a similar purpose in becoming a professional degree instead of an academic "doctorate" per say. At most places the Ed.D. is a somewhat less substantial degree than the Ph.D. anyway, so why not package it into a professional model? It would certainly be hard to pay teachers so little with a "D." in the letters after their name. If "doctor" is too much for your taste, perhaps we could offer the Ed.S.? 

I don't know. I am just playing with the idea, but I think it has some merit. There are obviously a lot of issues to work out, such as the number of students (I would venture that there are four-times as many teachers as doctors and lawyers combined ... do you try to get them all the degree?) - but I don't think it is an idea that should be dismissed out of hand.  

Full post as published by Edjurist on March 09, 2009 (boomark / email).