>Thanks, Craig. I appreciate you comments. I never meant to impugn
>colleges or universities. I tried to word it so that it read the
>actual decision makers which is not necessarily the Art or Art
>Education Department. I realize that
>we are all pretty much directed by political types with no educational
>backgrounds. ....
Reatha,
Oh...I didn't think you are bashing "colleges or universities"...or
"art ed professor types" like me. I actually thought your comments
were pretty diplomatic and accurate. I was simply trying to make the
point that much of the decision-making about what an "art education
student" studies is determined by "political types" (as you mention
above) and accreditation agencies.
As I mentioned in my posting, we're (teacher preparation) under
attack right now and we will be seeing some sigificant changes in the
way that all teacher candidates are prepared to enter the classroom.
The situation in FLorida is critical right now. Everyone pretty much
feels the state (led by Jeb Bush) is trying to dismantle traditional
teacher ed programs and is opening the door to alternative
certification routes. In short, schools here are getting so
desperate for teachers they'll take any warm body. (I'm not
suggesting there aren't people out there who are able to teach well
without taking the traditional route to certification.)
For us in art education, the curriculum for preparing future art
teachers is now becoming so saturated with issues/content that
there's little time left for our students to actually study art
(e.g., our art ed students have to take reading classes be able to
set up a "testing" environment in the classroom, be able to read the
results of state tests in math and reading, etc,) I would rather see
some of that time go to study in studio art and art history.
Well...enough said. It sounds to me you're dealing with the same sort of thing.
Craig
_______________________________________________________________________
CRAIG ROLAND. Associate Professor-Art Education.
School of Art and Art History, FAC 302,
University of Florida, Gainesville Florida.
32611-5801. (352) 392-9165 - Art Ed Office (352) 392-8453 - Fax
http://grove.ufl.edu/~rolandc/homepage.html
new email address: rolandc@ufl.edu
