Dear Student Teacher,
Last semester, we invited you to complete an online survey about your student teaching experience. We thank you and everyone who took part in the survey--we received 133 completed surveys. We have analyzed your responses to the closed-ended and open-ended questions, and have shared summaries of the findings with the Office of Teacher Education, as well as the program faculty. As we value your time and your feedback, we would like to address some of the general concerns that you raised, and to share with you the main findings of the survey. (Please see attachment for survey’s main findings.)
1. Turning survey findings into action. Several respondents wondered if and how the information gathered in this survey will be used for program improvement. We are glad to inform you that the Office of Teacher Education is already working on making improvements such as clarifying requirements and expectations for student teachers, cooperating teachers, and supervisors in different programs, and developing orientations and training sessions for supervisors and cooperating teachers. We would like you to know that we do not support the practice of conducting surveys to let the data lie fallow.
2. Your suggestions. We have taken note of your suggestions to improve the survey by clarifying some terms (eg., use “field supervisor” instead of “college supervisor”); by specifying which cooperating teacher to refer to if you had worked with more than one; and sending out the survey at more convenient and less stressful times (eg., not during the week before finals).
3. Anonymity. It is true that when you choose to identify your cooperating teacher and supervisor by their names, you give up your anonymity but, as we explained in the introduction to the questionnaire, we guarantee confidentiality of your responses. We abide by the professional ethics, standards and regulations regarding confidentiality of our survey participants. We carefully weighed the potential risks students take when they choose to give this information, as well as the potential for improving the programs when we share summaries of findings with the Office of Teacher Education and program faculty. We would like to assure you that, to safeguard your identity to the greatest extent possible, the names of cooperating teachers and supervisors will not be shared with the program faculty till we have collected data from several cohorts of student teachers. In addition, if you prefer not to reveal personally identifiable information, you have the option of leaving these questions blank.
4. Length of survey. A few students commented that the survey was too long. We developed this questionnaire to help TC programs take concrete steps to improve or transform the student teaching experience. We will assess how useful each question is and shorten the survey if possible.
As always, we appreciate any comments or suggestions.
If you are currently student teaching, please consider taking part in our next Student Teacher Feedback Survey, which will be sent out in April. Thank you and have a great semester!
Thank you,
Sasha Gribovskaya, DirectorOffice of Accreditation and Assessment
410 Russell Hall
(212) 678-4157
Gribovskaya@tc.edu
Clare Sng, Associate Director
Office of Accreditation and Assessment
410 Russell Hall
(212) 678-3093
Sng@tc.edu
Julia Yu, Associate Director
Office of Teacher Education and School-based Support Services
400 Russell Hall
(212) 678-3978
Yu@tc.edu