Teacher Ed. and School Leaders Programs Receive Clean CAEP Reaccreditation
by Josephine Elliott | Wednesday, Dec 07, 2022
Florida Atlantic University’s College of Education (COE) teacher education and school leaders programs that lead to eligibility for certification received final accreditation with no areas for improvement and no stipulations on Nov. 18, 2022 under the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) for a period of seven years from fall 2022 to fall 2029.
“Getting a clean CAEP report like this is very rare and is a result of the work of our faculty and staff in educator preparation and school engagement team that coordinated the reports and organized our accreditation visit.” stated COE Dean Stephen Silverman, Ed.D. “Thank you all. And a special thanks to Andy Brewer, Traci Catto and Robyn Klein who spent countless hours writing, editing and rewriting our reports and then organized our accreditation visit.”
CAEP, a national accrediting body, reviews initial teacher certification programs and advanced programs. Its mission is “to advance equity and excellence in educator preparation through evidence-based accreditation that assures quality and supports continuous improvement to strengthen P-12 student learning.”
The approved initial programs and advanced programs are offered by the Departments of Curriculum and Instruction; Educational Leadership and Research Methodology; and Special Education. “Faculty groups and administrators [from each of these departments] were key to the overall successful review,” noted Brewer, “Without them we would not have had the evidence.”
The Office for Accreditation, Assessment and Analytics (OAAA) and the Office for School Engagement (OSE), both headed by Brewer, took responsibility for organizing and facilitating the approximately two-year process, which consists of a self-study and evidence gathering. Two teams were assembled: a writing team, consisting of OAAA and OSE staff, and faculty-led teams.
Both teams first cleared up areas for improvement that were attached to the last CAEP visit in 2015. The writing team was primarily responsible for writing, rewriting, editing and submitting the self-study and 135 pieces of evidence to CAEP.
Faculty-led teams from each department gathered the evidence for each program under each of the rigorous CAEP Standards. Faculty teams with specific expertise provided evidence of diversity and technology within each program.
Once the self-study and evidence was submitted, CAEP responded with clarifying questions. The writing team wrote an addendum to address those questions and scheduled a virtual site visit, which was held in April 2022.
There were no concerns from the site visit, according to Brewer, only a couple of clarifying questions. After the accreditation council met, they had no clarifying questions. The College “received the reaccreditation letter,” noted Brewer, “having met all requirements of CAEP accreditation.”