Now You Shall Be Real to Everyone

This speech, by a member of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education's Commission on Education for the Profession of Teaching (CEPT) and one of the authors of the CEPT report, is a discussion of CEPT. He begins by discussing whether or not the teaching profession and teacher education are "real" professions. He takes the view that they are not and that the task ahead for teacher educators is to know what constitutes a "real" profession and to pursue it with wisdom and vigor. Next, he talks about problems in schools, and states that no effort to improve schools in America is likely to succeed until progress is made in improving the professional education of teachers. He urges that the governance of the teaching profession must be given to teacher educators and not to the states. He believes that one way to achieve a professional status in teacher education is to increase the teacher education curriculum to include a fifth year internship. He highlights portions of the CEPT report and states that the commission is neither uncritical of nor does it defend universities and their performance in teacher education. He concludes that the teaching profession will be a "real" profession when society recognizes teachers as highly competent professionals, when the universities and colleges accord them status, when the profession supports and cherishes them, and when their own self-respect and self-esteem tells them that they are real at last. (RC)