Stanford Teacher Ed Program To Help Recruit 230 STEM Teachers

• By Tim Sohn
• 10/19/11

The Stanford Teacher Education Program has agreed to recruit and prepare 230 top-notch science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) K-12 teachers over the next five years through its elementary and secondary teacher preparation programs.

This one project is a component of nationwide initiative 100Kin10, which involves the help of more than 80 partners, including the New York City Department of Education, Teach for America, Google, Intel, and NASA, and calls for the development of 100,000 teachers to help students excel in STEM. It is headed up by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and Opportunity Equation.

The goal of 100Kin10 is "to prepare all students with the high-quality STEM knowledge and skills needed to address the most pressing national and global challenges of tomorrow," according to information on the organization's website.

Stanford will review the performance of students in its teacher preparation programs, and partner with local school districts and nonprofit groups that need candidates the most. Doctoral students will help teach classes and supervise teacher candidates.

"We are honored to be one of the few university-based teacher education programs selected to participate in this national initiative," said Professor Rachel Lotan, director of the Stanford Teacher Education Program. "Our teaching candidates are led by our outstanding faculty and they learn to practice teaching under the mentorship of highly qualified cooperating teachers in our partner schools. We are excited to build on the excellence of our program and our efforts to recruit and prepare exceptional STEM teachers."

Other 100Kin10 partnership projects include:

• California State University will ready 1,500 math and science teachers through 2015;
• Google and The Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT will work together to create a teacher recognition program;
• NASA will provide access to science and engineering research projects, and technologies appropriate for the classroom;
• The State of Maryland will develop partnerships and invest in STEM teacher preparation; and
• Teach for America will recruit 11,000 STEM teachers by 2015.

The nationwide initiative was first announced in June at a Clinton Global Initiative meeting in Chicago. It currently has $20 million in funding to allocate to partners.

"[Our future] demands that we give every child the skills and education they need to succeed. And I thank you for the commitment that you made to recruit and train tens of thousands of new science, technology, engineering, and math teachers. Nothing could be more important," said former President Bill Clinton at the meeting.

Any organization can apply to be a partner, but needs to be nominated by an existing partner. Examples include nonprofit groups, corporations, school districts, colleges and universities, foundations, professional associations, federal agencies, and states. The next round of partnership nominations is slated for the late fall.

Any organization interested in becoming a partner can visit 100kin10.org.