To increase the Number and Quality of New Teachers who are Highly Skilled in Using Technology to Improve Instruction

Western Kentucky University's College of Education and Behavioral Sciences has received an Innovation Challenge Grant from the United States Department of Education. The project, called e-train express, will implement programs and strategies that  increase the number and quality of new teachers who are highly effective in using technology to facilitate, assess and communicate learning for all students.

Since only 20% of current teachers feel comfortable using technology in their classrooms and over two million new technology proficient teachers will be needed in the next decade, Western Kentucky University (WKU), along with partner schools [schools in the 28 districts of the Green River Regional Educational Cooperative (GRREC)], the Compass Learning Corporation and NetTango are implementing programs and practices designed:

• To ensure that all teachers who graduate from our teacher education program can use technology to increase student achievement;
• To ensure that all graduates can use technology to assess student learning;
• To ensure that all university faculty from both teacher education and the arts and sciences departments can model effective technology-assisted instruction for prospective  teachers;
• To ensure that electronic portfolios are used as the primary means of gathering data used in the evaluation of teacher performance;
• To use technology to show K-12 students that teaching is a good career option; and
• To set up an electronic clearinghouse that will give teachers and teacher educators throughout the country access to exemplary technology-assisted lesson plans and assessments.

Western Kentucky University believes that technology has the potential to make teaching and learning far more efficient than in the past. Technology not only gives people access to new information, it gives them more opportunities to work together. The e-train express will enable WKU to integrate technology in teacher preparation courses and use technology to spread the best practices that develop from them.

Programs offered through e-train express include:

• An array of faculty development opportunities; mixing teacher educators, arts and science faculty and K-12 teachers to mentor teacher candidates;
• Summer technology camps where kids, teachers and faculty learn and apply technology together;
• Mindstorm media mini-grants;
• Wide use of electronic portfolios for preservice and K-12 teaching and learning; and
• Requiring all graduates to demonstrate technology rich teaching units that meet the National Educational Technology Standards.