Emergency Teacher Certification: Summary and Recommendations

The growing belief by the general public that education in America is at best mediocre has focused interest on the qualitative dimensions of education in general and teacher education specifically. &dquo;Raising standards&dquo; has become a part of the national rhetoric, as an array of educational reform proposals have captured media attention. Some of the extreme reform proposals suggest that the practice of certifying teachers should be radically curtailed or elimi-nated entirely. The role of teacher certification is to ensure for the benefit of the public that candidates for teaching are adequately prepared and safe to practice the profession of teaching before being allowed to assume complete respon-sibility for a class. Being fully certified implies that such candidates have successfully completed a program o