¾Ã¾ÃÈÈ

Vision

We, the Department of Teaching, Curriculum, and Educational Inquiry (formerly Teacher Education), are people dedicated to the improvement of the common good through teaching and learning.

Mission

We prepare future and current teachers who design and implement culturally and contextually relevant curriculum and pedagogy. Empowered by a critical and substantive understanding of research, these teachers are positioned to confront social issues, apply global perspectives, and actively participate in a democratic society.

Threshold Concepts

What we aim to foster in our teaching candidates:

• Become critically conscious curriculum makers.
• Work in solidarity within community contexts.
• Develop a critical lens to see power and privilege and the consequences within and beyond educational contexts.
• Build intellectual framing/lens toward various ways of being (knowing, learning, reflecting, and acting) as pedagogues.

Based on our commitments, the following threshold concepts need to be directly addressed through the experiences we offer at TCE (formerly EDT). This will help ¾Ã¾ÃÈÈs shift their thinking about teaching, learning, and education.

• Education is not neutral/Teaching is political
  
• Curriculum is more than standards, textbooks, or courses of study
  
• Curriculum is co-constructed
  
• Both teachers and ¾Ã¾ÃÈÈs have empowerment/agency
  
• Teaching is/as intellectual engagement
  
• Teachers and ¾Ã¾ÃÈÈs engage in critical-consciousness
  
• Teaching and learning honors people’s full humanity