Texas Administrative Code › Title 19 - EDUCATION › Part 7 - STATE BOARD FOR EDUCATOR CERTIFICATION › Chapter 228 - REQUIREMENTS FOR EDUCATOR PREPARATION PROGRAMS › Subchapter D - REQUIRED EDUCATOR COURSEWORK AND TRAINING › Section 228.31 - Minimum Educator Preparation Program Obligations to All Candidates

Current through Reg. 49, No. 28; July 12, 2024
(a) Each educator
				  preparation program (EPP) must develop and implement a calendar of program
				  activities that must include a deadline for accepting candidates into a program
				  cycle to assure adequate time for admission, coursework, training, and
				  field-based experience requirements prior to a clinical teaching or internship
				  experience. If an EPP accepts candidates after the deadline, the EPP must
				  develop and implement a calendar of program activities to assure adequate time
				  for admission, coursework, training, and field-based experience requirements
				  prior to a clinical teaching experience or internship or, if a late hire, by
				  the specified deadline in the late hire provision.
(b) All EPPs shall have a published exit
				  policy for dismissal of candidates that is reviewed and signed by candidates
				  upon admission. The exit policy must identify a point of dismissal for inactive
				  candidates after no more than two years of inactivity, or university-based EPPs
				  may adopt their institution's policy. An inactive candidate is one who is no
				  longer completing coursework, training, and testing requirements with an EPP
				  and is not a completer of the EPP.
(c) To ensure that a candidate for educator
				  certification is prepared to receive a standard or enhanced standard
				  certificate, the EPP shall establish benchmarks and structured assessments of
				  the candidate's progress throughout the EPP and provide support and
				  interventions to each candidate based on the benchmark and structured
				  assessment results.
(d) An EPP is
				  responsible for ensuring that each candidate is adequately prepared to pass the
				  appropriate examination(s) required for certification. An EPP shall determine
				  the readiness of each candidate to take the appropriate certification
				  examination of content, pedagogy, and professional responsibilities, including
				  professional ethics and standards of conduct.
(e) The EPP shall grant test approval when
				  the EPP determines the candidate is ready, or if the candidate is a completer.
				  An EPP may make test approval contingent on a candidate completing additional
				  coursework and/or training to show that the candidate is prepared to pass the
				  test if the candidate is seeking test approval from the EPP in an area where
				  the standards and/or test changed since the candidate completed all
				  requirements of the EPP or if the candidate has returned to the EPP for test
				  approval one or more years following the academic year of completion of all
				  program requirements.
(f) Upon the
				  written request of the candidate, an EPP may prepare a candidate and grant test
				  approval for a classroom teacher certificate category other than the category
				  for which the candidate was initially admitted to the EPP only if:
(1) the candidate would meet the requirements
				  for admission under §
											227.10 of this title (relating to
				  Admission Criteria) in the requested certificate category;
(2) the EPP provides coursework and training
				  in the educator standards and test framework competencies related to the
				  requested certificate category; and
(3) the EPP ensures that the candidate is
				  adequately prepared to pass the appropriate content pedagogy examination(s)
				  required for the requested certificate category.