A Collaborative Journey Toward Inclusive Teacher Education Programs

The journey described in this article reflects the ongoing collaboration between two faculty in a Childhood Inclusive Teacher Education Program seeking to further develop a more inclusive curriculum. Crosswalk examples between the Council for Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) and Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) standards and two course assessment examples are included to help provide insights into the process of creating meaningful assessments for use in a dual-certification teacher education program. When the members of a faculty decide to move away from single-certification programs to dual-certification programs, it becomes imperative that they collaborate with each other in new ways. Single-certification teacher preparation programs focus solely on educating candidates so they can enter the workforce prepared to teach elementary or adolescent-level students in general education classroom settings. This focus means that faculty feel confident with what they know will best prepare preservice teachers to meet the rigorous demands of their respective areas of expertise, and they will create course requirements that align readily with the skills and knowledge needed for success. In a very real sense, provided the faculty members take ownership of their own curriculum, the programs can exist even with limited collaboration among faculty. Inclusive dual-certification programs lead to preservice teachers receiving certification in both a general education specialty area and special education. The implementation of such inclusive programs demands more direct collaboration, where faculty see themselves as intertwined versus separated in their efforts to create meaningfully integrated programs that are more authentically inclusive. While there are many possibilities when creating and implementing a truly inclusive program, there are also several constraints that need to be addressed and overcome. This is a process that takes time and dedication on the part of faculty for inclusive programs to develop successfully. The goal of this article is to describe a local collaborative effort that sought to address ways to make programs more inclusive. Instead of an isolated approach, faculty started to encourage across-Specialty Professional Association (SPA) communication to aggregate and integrate SPA standards into the curriculum and assessments with the goal of finding meaningful connections. Following a review of literature on inclusion, accreditation and standardization, and collaboration in teacher education, the details of this collaborative journey are shared.