ABSTRACT
In this chapter I discuss the research based on recruiting, preparing, and retaining good teachers for all of our children in relation to the different reform agendas that are currently being implemented in U.S. teacher education. Currently, there are three major agendas for the reform of teacher education being played out in teacher education programs across the country: (a) the well-publicized professionalization agenda, propelled by the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future (NCTAF) Report, National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), Teacher Education Accreditation Council (TEAC), the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, and other groups; (b) the deregulation agenda, supported by the work of the Fordham Foundation and other conservative think tanks and foundations like the Abell Foundation, the Pacific Research Institute, and the Progressive Policy Institute; and (c) the social justice agenda, implemented by individual teacher education practitioners in their teacher education classrooms and supported by groups like the National Association for Multicultural Education, policy centers like Tomas Rivéra Center and Center for the Future of Teaching and Learning, and grassroots organizations like Rethinking Schools in Milwaukee. There is a fourth agenda that Cochran-Smith (2001) has referred to as the overregulation agenda, which consists of efforts in some states to micromanage teacher education programs and the punitive Title II reporting requirements set by Congress. I am not going to discuss it here because this agenda is largely a reflection of aspects of both the professionalization and deregulation agendas.2
