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Most teachers and education experts agree preparation and licensing for teachers in this country is in disarray. The problem is so serious, the American Federation of Teachers is proposing a bar exam akin to the one lawyers have to pass before they can practice.
But as NPR's Claudio Sanchez reports, that proposal raises more questions than answers.
CLAUDIO SANCHEZ, BYLINE: Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, says the system for admitting, preparing and selecting teachers is broken.
RANDI WEINGARTEN: How do you deal with the patchwork we have in the United States of 50 different states, lots of different certification requirements?
SANCHEZ: And no single standard to determine who's fit and who's not fit to teach. It's an archaic system that Weingarten says must be replaced with one question in mind.
WEINGARTEN: How do you ensure that an individual teacher walking into her classroom the first day is confident and competent? What happens in other professions?
SANCHEZ: Like law and medicine. Weingarten, who was a lawyer before she was a classroom teacher, is convinced that something akin to a bar exam for teachers is the answer. It would test the person's knowledge based on what he was hired to teach - math, English, history, science. It would gauge his understanding of how children learn. And third...
WEINGARTEN: There had to be some residency or actual classroom practice beforehand, some real internship before you walked into teaching.
SANCHEZ: Weingarten isn't the only one pushing a bar-like exam for teachers. U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan supports it, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo wants his state to adopt the idea. But there are huge differences in how we attract and select people to become teachers and lawyers or doctors. Law schools and medical schools, for example, have really tough admission standards. Education schools don't.
SANDRA STOTSKY: You have more problems today with ineffective teachers because we've had virtually open admissions into the profession.
SANCHEZ: Sandra Stotsky once oversaw the licensing of teachers for the state of Massachusetts. She says too many people who graduate with a teaching degree can't teach because the standards are so low. But it's just one of many problems, says Arthur Levine, former president of Teacher's College, Columbia University.
ARTHUR LEVINE: At the moment, clinical education and academic programs are entirely disconnected. People in the profession don't even agree on how to prepare people for this field.
SANCHEZ: Maybe, says Levine, just maybe a bar exam for teachers could have a positive impact.
LEVINE: The effect it could have is that standards in ed schools are really low. It could force them to raise them.
SANCHEZ: If you're going to have something like a bar exam for teachers, Levine says, you need a clear definition of how to become a teacher. You need a higher quality of students and better programs to prepare them. And you need political support to make sure all these things are aligned.
LEVINE: It's primarily states that have to get on board.
SANCHEZ: Which means there are lots of turf battles out there. The purpose of most state licensure tests after all is, first and foremost, to protect children from incompetent teachers not license only the smartest, most competent people. AFT president Randi Weingarten says everybody should be fed up with the disarray in how this country prepares and hires teachers.
WEINGARTEN: It's demeaning to our profession. It's demeaning to our practice. And no one would ever think that a lawyer who's not prepared should go into a courtroom and try a case without any preparation.
SANCHEZ: Weingarten says a bar exam for teachers could be ready in five years. Claudio Sanchez, NPR News.