Obviously, we can't blame all these problems on the nadequacies of the nation's schools. Like so many other institutions, they are the victims of the current assault on the public sector. As the sociologist Robert Bellah argues in this issue's lead article, the commodification of higher education has turned students into consumers who refuse to pay a high intellectual price for their credentials. Nonetheless, it is clear that something is wrong with our schools. As usual, scapegoats outnumber solutions, but the prime suspect is poor teaching, the result, so it is claimed, of the weak preparation that many teachers receive.
Most critics call for higher standards.
From Texas to Massachusetts, states are raising the requirements for prospective teachers and threatening sanctions against schools of education whose graduates do not make the grade. More thoughtful observers look beyond test scores, seeking substantive reforms that will revamp the way the nation's teachers are trained. As the men and women who teach those teachers, academic professionals are implicated in the teachers' fate. Yet most college professors, however concerned they may be, actually know little about how teachers are trained. To facilitate communication between teacher educators and the rest of us, Academe asked several experts in the field to tell us what's going on.