$4.2 million for teacher education awarded to BGSU

BOWLING GREEN, O.–For the second time this fall, Bowling Green State University has received a major federal grant to support teacher preparation in "high-need" public schools.

The U.S. Department of Education has announced BGSU will receive $4.2 million in Education Teacher Quality Enhancement Partnerships funding over the next five years. The grant program is aimed at providing better training for pre-service teachers and strengthening current teachers in their subject areas in order to boost student achievement.

BGSU was one of only eight universities nationwide out of 100 applicants to qualify in a highly competitive process for the award. The new project will complement the recently announced $4.7million GEAR UP project which focuses on working with students and their parents in urban schools.

"We felt fairly confident in submitting this proposal," said project director Dr. Robert Midden, an associate professor of chemistry who teaches in the Chapman Learning Community. "Bowling Green has really been on the cutting edge of teacher preparation and innovation in education and has many demonstrated successes."

BGSU’s plan, titled "Partners in Context and Community," will bring educators together with others to help teachers be successful in high-need urban schools. Project participants believe that what is learned can be transferred to other educational settings as well.

The plan will begin with the "middle childhood" grades of four through nine and will involve East Toledo Junior High School, an elementary school and, eventually, Waite High School. About 50 BGSU education majors who are interested in teaching that age group in high-need urban schools will participate in the program initially.

Community organizations will play an important role in helping educators and students understand the communities in which they will be teaching.

"The East Toledo Family Center in particular will offer us a rich array of opportunities to learn more about the families of East Toledo and to contextualize the teacher-preparation process," Midden said. The center served more than 2,500 TPS students last year through its numerous activities and programs in cooperation with the schools, including after-school tutoring, enrichment activities and child care, and an alternative school.

Tim Yenrick, director of the center, said he hopes that by having student interns participate in the center’s youth activities, they will "get the flavor of what it is to work in the inner city.

"One of our goals is to be not only a service organization but a teaching institution as well. We hope that by having these (BGSU) students in our programs with their new ideas, we’ll learn something from them, they’ll learn from us and our families will benefit. I see this as another relationship, which, if we build it right, will last a long time."

Other community participants are the Sofia Quintero Art and Cultural Center, which has much to offer in terms of teaching about diversity, and the Common Space for the Arts in Toledo.

Area businesses and organizations such as Sunoco and St. Charles Hospital in Toledo, Ball Corporation in Findlay and the East Toledo Club, will contribute their perspective on what is important to know in order to be successful in life. They will help design "real-life" situations for learning and advise on the applicability of BGSU and TPS coursework in the work world.