ABSTRACT
As the School of Education at Brooklyn College pressed forward in preparation for the 2005 visit from NCATE, faculty members who were directly involved met with colleagues from other branches of the City University of New York. We heard again and again in those meetings as well as in our own faculty meetings not only how to meet the demands of the examiners but also justifications for those demands. The quotidian reminders about collecting data, aligning syllabi with standards, and developing instruments to monitor performance were frequently justified with appeals to the “national conversation” on educational policy and practices. It seemed more a monologue than a conversation. Whether one read the latest editorial or report, whether one attended AACTE’s annual conference or a breakfast meeting with representatives from New York City’s Department of Education, the same slogans, shibboleths, calls to action, and recommendations pullulated into mandates, regulations, and
requirements. These, in turn, materialized as tests, whether in the form of student exams or accreditation examinations to measure the health of teacher education programs.
