State shows performance assessments of area teacher prep programs

This Feb. 5, 2015, file photo shows a student crossing the pedestrian bridge near Page Library on the Lincoln University campus.
This Feb. 5, 2015, file photo shows a student crossing the pedestrian bridge near Page Library on the Lincoln University campus.

Lincoln University's elementary education certification program would have been one of the area teacher preparation programs that would have earned accreditation under new standards for Missouri's Annual Performance Reports for Educator Preparation Programs - had accreditation levels been awarded at all this year.

People may be more familiar with the state's APR scores for K-12 schools, districts and charter schools, but the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education also measures the performance of college and university programs that prepare education degree-seeking candidates to become teachers.

Lincoln's elementary education grades 1-6 certification program earned 97.73 percent of points possible on the APR-EPP, as it's identified by DESE. LU's score is well-above the 70 percent cut-off to receive accredited status.

A score of 60-69.9 percent would earn provisional accreditation, and a score of 59.9 percent or less would merit an unaccredited status.

APR-EPPs "support continuous improvement through a collaborative effort between (DESE) and educator preparation programs," according to a news release from DESE released in February.

The 2018 APR-EPP changed from the previous year, because the latest report is based on all nine Missouri Teaching Standards - which are content knowledge; student learning and development; curriculum implementation; critical thinking; classroom environment; effective communication; assessment and data analysis; professionalism; and professional collaboration.

"Because of the change in calculation, no accreditation levels have been awarded for teacher preparation programs this year," according to the news release.

The APR-EPP scores that are publicly viewable are not for rating colleges or universities' education programs as a whole, but for rating the individual certification areas offered within the programs, such as in art, business education, English, mathematics, special education and social science - and each of those can be for different sets of grade levels.

LU's other teacher certification programs - the school has 18 approved teacher certification programs, according to DESE - did not have 10 or more teacher candidates in them in the five-year period reported by the latest APR-EPP, which means the performance data for those other programs are hidden from public view.

Members of DESE's Office of Educator Preparation said Friday, though, the 2018 APR-EPP only reflects one year's worth of data, and the sample size of measured certification programs will increase with more time. The DESE staff added that programs that don't have their data visible are still held accountable by the department.

None of William Woods University's teacher certification programs - of which there are 13 - met the cut-off for their data to be visible in the 2018 APR-EPP results.

Nine of the University of Missouri's early childhood; elementary; middle school language arts and math; high school agricultural education, English, math and social science; and special education certification programs would have earned accreditation based on their scores, with percentages all in the high 90s.

Columbia College's elementary education grades 1-6 certification program would have earned accreditation with a score of 97.94 percent. Southwest Baptist University's elementary education 1-6 program would have earned full accreditation at 100 percent.

At the University of Central Missouri, five of its early childhood, elementary education, K-12 art, middle school math and special education certification programs would have earned accreditation, and the school's social science 9-12 certification program would have earned provisional accreditation with a score of 67.11 percent.

William Woods, MU, LU, Columbia College, UCM and Southwest Baptist - in that order - are among the schools that graduate the most applicants for Jefferson City Public Schools, according to the district's staffing report released last fall.

More APR-EPP data is available for the public to see at apps.dese.mo.gov/MCDS/home.aspx. Scroll down and click on "Educator Preparation" on the left side. At the center of the top of the page, click on "Reports and Resources," and then select "Annual Performance Report for Teacher Preparation Program - Program Summary - 2018 Public."

A comprehensive guide to the APR-EPP's scoring system is available on the same page, and within the report, people can select individual schools. A certification program's percent score is calculated by adding up the weighted points displayed and considering the total a percentage.