The mission of the Educator Preparation Program (EPP) is to prepare educators who are competent, intentional, reflective, culturally responsive, leading, and empathic 21st Century Professionals.  The EPP strives to provide all teacher candidates at the initial and advanced level with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions necessary to become effective teachers/leaders by offering the highest quality instruction and programs. The advanced program strives to further develop and enhance the knowledge base of the practicing professional.  As candidates progress through the graduate curriculum, the improvement, refinement, and practice of professional knowledge bases, skills, and dispositions are enhanced and refined.

The Department collaborates with representatives from public schools, professional groups, government, and other programs within the University to prepare educators and to cooperate in the development of educational policies. The Department also strives for the improvement of education at the local, state, regional, and national levels in that the improvement of schooling results in a more literate and enlightened citizenry. This, in turn, contributes to the proliferation of democratic values and enhances our position in the global economy.

Objective 1. Content and Pedagogical Knowledge

Ensure that candidates develop a deep understanding of the critical concepts and principles of their discipline and, by completion, are able to use discipline-specific practices flexibly to advance the learning of all students toward attainment of college- and career-readiness standards.

Candidate Knowledge, Skills, and Professional Dispositions

• 1.1 Candidates demonstrate an understanding of the 10 InTASC standards at the appropriate progression level(s) in the following categories: the learner and learning; content; instructional practice; and professional responsibility.

Responsibilities:

• 1.2 Ensure that candidates use research and evidence to develop an understanding of the teaching profession and use both to measure their P-12 students’ progress and their own professional practice.
• 1.3 Ensure that candidates apply content and pedagogical knowledge as reflected in outcome assessments in response to standards of Specialized Professional Associations (SPA), the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS), states, or other accrediting bodies (e.g., National Association of Schools of Music – NASM).
• 1.4 Ensure that candidates demonstrate skills and commitment that afford all P-12 students access to rigorous college- and career-ready standards (e.g., Next Generation Science Standards, National Career Readiness Certificate, Common Core State Standards).

• ​1.5 Ensure that candidates model and apply technology standards as they design, implement and assess learning experiences to engage students and improve learning; and enrich professional practice. 

Objective 2. Clinical Partnerships and Practice

Ensure that effective partnerships and high-quality clinical practice are central to preparation so that candidates develop the knowledge, skills, and professional dispositions necessary to demonstrate positive impact on all P-12 students’ learning and development.

Partnerships for Clinical Preparation:

• 2.1 Partners co-construct mutually beneficial P-12 school and community arrangements, including technology-based collaborations, for clinical preparation and share responsibility for continuous improvement of candidate preparation. Partnerships for clinical preparation can follow a range of forms, participants, and functions. They establish mutually agreeable expectations for candidate entry, preparation, and exit; ensure that theory and practice are linked; maintain coherence across clinical and academic components of preparation; and share accountability for candidate outcomes.  

Clinical Educators:

• 2.2 Partners co-select, prepare, evaluate, support, and retain high-quality clinical educators, both provider- and school-based, who demonstrate a positive impact on candidates’ development and P-12 student learning and development. In collaboration with their partners, providers use multiple indicators and appropriate technology-based applications to establish, maintain, and refine criteria for selection, professional development, performance evaluation, continuous improvement, and retention of clinical educators in all clinical placement settings.  

Clinical Experiences:

• 2.3 Work with partners to design clinical experiences of sufficient depth, breadth, diversity, coherence, and duration to ensure that candidates demonstrate their developing effectiveness and positive impact on all students’ learning and development. Clinical experiences, including technology-enhanced learning opportunities, are structured to have multiple performance-based assessments at key points within the program to demonstrate candidates’ development of the knowledge, skills, and professional dispositions, as delineated in Standard 1, that are associated with a positive impact on the learning and development of all P-12 students.

Objective 3. Candidate Quality, Recruitment, and Selectivity

Demonstrate that the quality of candidates is a continuing and purposeful part of its responsibility from recruitment, at admission, through the progression of courses and clinical experiences, and to decisions that completers are prepared to teach effectively and are recommended for certification. The provider demonstrates that development of candidate quality is the goal of educator preparation in all phases of the program. This process is ultimately determined by a program’s meeting of Standard 4.

Plan for Recruitment of Diverse Candidates who Meet Employment Needs:

• 3.1 Present plans and goals to recruit and support completion of high-quality candidates from a broad range of backgrounds and diverse populations to accomplish their mission. The admitted pool of candidates reflects the diversity of America’s P-12 students. The provider demonstrates efforts to know and address community, state, national, regional, or local needs for hard-to-staff schools and shortage fields, currently, STEM, English-language learning, and students with disabilities.  

Candidates Demonstrate Academic Achievement:

• 3.2 Meet CAEP minimum criteria or the state’s minimum criteria for academic achievement, whichever are higher, and gathers disaggregated data on the enrolled candidates whose preparation begins during an academic year.  

Additional Selectivity Factors:

• 3.3 Establish and monitor attributes and dispositions beyond academic ability that candidates must demonstrate at admissions and during the program. The provider selects criteria, describes the measures used and evidence of the reliability and validity of those measures, and reports data that show how the academic and non-academic factors predict candidate performance in the program and effective teaching.  

Selectivity During Preparation:

• 3.4 Create criteria for program progression and monitors candidates’ advancement from admissions through completion. All candidates demonstrate the ability to teach to college- and career-ready standards. Providers present multiple forms of evidence to indicate candidates’ developing content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, pedagogical skills, and the integration of technology in all of these domains.  

Selection At Completion:

• 3.5 Before recommendation of any completing candidate for licensure or certification, it documents that the candidate has reached a high standard for content knowledge in the fields where certification is sought and can teach effectively with positive impacts on P-12 student learning and development.
• 3.6 Before recommendatuib any completing candidate for licensure or certification, it documents that the candidate understands the expectations of the profession, including codes of ethics, professional standards of practice, and relevant laws and policies. CAEP monitors the development of measures that assess candidates’ success and revises standards in light of new results

Objective 4. Program Impact

The provider demonstrates the impact of its completers on P-12 student learning and development, classroom instruction, and schools, and the satisfaction of its completers with the relevance and effectiveness of their preparation.

Impact on P-12 Student Learning and Development:

• 4.1 Document, using multiple measures that program completers contribute to an expected level of student-learning growth. Multiple measures shall include all available growth measures (including value-added measures, student-growth percentiles, and student learning and development objectives) required by the state for its teachers and available to educator preparation providers, other state-supported P-12 impact measures, and any other measures employed by the provider.

Indicators of Teaching Effectiveness:

• 4.2 Demonstrate, through structured validated observation instruments and/or student surveys, that completers effectively apply the professional knowledge, skills, and dispositions that the preparation experiences were designed to achieve.

Satisfaction of Employers:

• 4.3. Demonstrate, using measures that result in valid and reliable data and including employment milestones such as promotion and retention, that employers are satisfied with the completers’ preparation for their assigned responsibilities in working with P-12 students.

Satisfaction of Completers:

• 4.4 Demonstrate, using measures that result in valid and reliable data, that program completers perceive their preparation as relevant to the responsibilities they confront on the job, and that the preparation was effective.

Objective 5. Provider Quality Assurance and Continuous Improvement

The provider maintains a quality assurance system comprised of valid data from multiple measures, including evidence of candidates’ and completers’ positive impact on P-12 student learning and development. The provider supports continuous improvement that is sustained and evidence-based, and that evaluates the effectiveness of its completers. The provider uses the results of inquiry and data collection to establish priorities, enhance program elements and capacity, and test innovations to improve completers’ impact on P-12 student learning and development.

Quality and Strategic Evaluation:

• 5.1 Quality assurance system is comprised of multiple measures that can monitor candidate progress, completer achievements, and provider operational effectiveness. Evidence demonstrates that the provider satisfies all CAEP standards.
• 5.2 Quality assurance system relies on relevant, verifiable, representative, cumulative and actionable measures, and produces empirical evidence that interpretations of data are valid and consistent.

Continuous Improvement:

• 5.3. Regularly and systematically assesses performance against its goals and relevant standards, tracks results over time, tests innovations and the effects of selection criteria on subsequent progress and completion, and uses results to improve program elements and processes.
• 5.4. Measure of completer impact, including available outcome data on P-12 student growth, are summarized, externally benchmarked, analyzed, shared widely, and acted upon in decision-making related to programs, resource allocation, and future direction.
• 5.5. Assure that appropriate stakeholders, including alumni, employers, practitioners, school and community partners, and others defined by the provider, are involved in program evaluation, improvement, and identification of models of excellence. 

 

 

Concord University’s Department of Education offers undergraduate students a wide range of content specializations and endorsements. Students are formally accepted as education majors once they have been admitted into the Teacher Education Program. Acceptance into Concord University and declaration of education as a major does not mean you have been accepted into the Teacher Education Program. 

The Bachelor of Science in Education requires the successful completion of a minimum of 120 semester hours from the following areas: the General Education Program, the Professional Education Component, and the Content Specialization Component. Candidates are also required to meet criterion scores on PRAXIS Core Academic Skills for Educators and PRAXIS II: Subject Assessments (some specializations require more than one subject assessment) and the Principles of Learning and Teaching Test. Candidates must also meet West Virginia certification requirements.

The Bachelor of Science in Education degree will qualify a teacher candidate for recommendation of initial licensure to the West Virginia Department of Education. This is a requirement, even if the candidate intends to teach in another state. Through reciprocal licensure agreements, graduates may qualify for licensure in other states. Graduates may receive one-year probationary certification while filing to become a citizen of the United States, or when filing a declaration of intent to become a naturalized citizen.

Candidates who enter the Teacher Education Program, and graduate with a Bachelor of Science in Education, may seek certification in the following areas:

• Elementary (Grades K-6) prepares candidates to teach in elementary schools. This program may be combined with additional specializations.
• Content Specializations 5-Adult  prepare teacher candidates to teach at the secondary level. 
• Content Specializations Pre K-Adult prepare teacher candidates to teach in early education through adult education.
• Special Education Multi-Categorical (excluding Autism) K-6 & 5-Adult prepares teacher candidates to each special education at the elementary and/or secondary level.
• Early Childhood Special Education (Pre K-K) elective courses prepare candidates to teach Pre-K age children. This program does not lead to initial licensure. Students who wish to add this to their licensure must successfully complete the Praxis Content Knowledge Exam upon graduation.

Welcome to the Department of Education Graduate Program, dedicated to professional preparation and advancement. 

The mission of the Professional Education Unit for Teacher Education at Concord University is to prepare professional educators who are informed and thoughtful decision-makers capable of teaching a wide array of students and specializations in culturally diverse settings. The Professional Education Unit strives to provide all teacher candidates the knowledge and skills necessary to become effective teachers by offering the highest quality instruction and programs utilizing all available resources efficiently and effectively. The Graduate Program strives to further develop and enhance the knowledge base of the practicing professional. As individuals progress though the graduate curriculum, the improvement and refinement of professional knowledge bases, reflective analysis of practice, and judgment making capabilities are enhanced and refined.

In the summer of 2002 Concord was granted approval for the offering of graduate courses on a limited basis. Full approval of the graduate program was granted in August, 2003. The development of a graduate program was in alignment with the overall mission to serve southern West Virginia and to provide a quality program for the practicing professionals in the region. Currently, Concord University offers two Graduate Studies Programs focused on Education: Master of Art in Teaching and Master of Education. For more information on these programs, please reference the link below.

• Master of Arts in Teaching
• Master of Education
• Education Graduate Programs: Resources & Forms

Thank you for your interest to pursue your advanced degree at Concord University.

Professional Education Component

All teacher education candidates must earn a 2.75 GPA in the Professional Education Component, and complete all Professional Education Component courses with a grade of 'C' or better. Coursework in the Professional Education Component that is older than ten years may have to be repeated. 

Professional Education Core

• EDUC 210 Diversity, Culture, and Education in a Pluralistic Society (3 hrs)
• EDUC 301 Educational Technology (3 hrs)*
• EDUC 305 Psychology of Teaching and Learning (3 hrs)
• EDUC 306 Classroom Management and Instructional Strategies (3 hrs)
• EDUC 460 Student Teaching (12 hrs)
• EDSP 303 Introduction to Special Education (3 hrs)
• EDSP 415 Co-Teaching, Consultation and Collaboration (3 hrs) or EDSP 409 Strategies for rthe Secondary Classroom Inclusive Environment (3 hrs)**

*Not required for Music PreK-Adult.  Music Education majors must MUS 301
**Required for Elementary K-6 majors only.

Year Long Residency
Students who complete Part 1 of the Year Long Residency will then transition into Part 2 of the Year Long Residency (Student Teaching) within the same classroom.

• Students in Pre K-Adult and 5-Adult content specializations must complete EDUC410, EDUC416, EDUC418 and EDSP409 as part of the Year Long Residency Part 1
• Students in the Elementary Education content specialization must complete EDUC412, EDUC413, EDUC414 and EDUC416 as part of the Year Long Residency Part 1
• Students in the Special Education content specialization must complete the EDSP412, EDSP413, EDSP414 and EDSP415* as part of the Year Long Residency Part 1

Content Area Component

All teacher education candidates must earn the minimum required content area GPA, and meet any additional minimum course grade requirements as outlined in the Academic Catlaog. Content area coursework is specific to each content specialization.

Clinical Experiences

Candidates are required to complete Clinical Experiences in PreK-Adult Partner Schools located in counties that are part of Concord University's service area, as well as required seminars offered at the University. Concord University's service area includes public schools in the following counties in WV and VA: Fayette, Greenbrier, McDowell, Mercer, Monroe, Raleigh, Wyoming, Tazewell, Bland & Giles. 

Early Clinical Experiences are required by multiple education courses throughout the Professional Education Component, Content Specialization Component, and Methods Component. These Early Clinical Experiences will culminate in a Year Long Residency consisting of two parts. Students who complete Part 1 of the Year Long Residency will then transition into Part 2 of the Year Long Residency (Student Teaching) within the same classroom. Teacher Candidates are required to meet all special requirements set forth by each individual county's Board of Education if applicable.

​Candidates working toward the Bachelor of Science in Education degree are advised that all phases of teacher education require cooperative efforts between Concord University and the public schools or other agencies.The superintendent, or legal representatives of these agencies or schools, and the representative of the University shall have the authority, after consultation, to reject placement or terminate the participation of any candidate who fails to meet the professional standards of the cooperating school, agency, or the University.During student teaching, the reports of the supervising teacher(s) and the recommendation(s) of the University Supervisor are essential components in determining the eligibility for graduation and recommendation for licensure.

Partner Schools

Concord University is involved in a collaborative with local public schools.The Partner Schools are designed to prepare future educators, to provide current educators with ongoing professional development, to encourage joint school-university faculty investigation of education-related issues, and to promote the learning of P-12 students. The Partner Schools, structured as a network that includes University and public school faculty, parents, and community partners, seek to improve teacher education and meet professional development needs and goals as identified by public school faculty.The partnership collaborative provides the bridges that connect Concord’s teacher education program to the daily instructional practices that occur in P-12 schools. The Partner Schools serve as clinical sites for teacher candidates to teach under the guidance of an expert mentor teacher.The clinical experiences allow faculty from Concord and the partnerships to collaborate extensively in providing quality experiences for all teacher candidates involved in the initiative.The public schools benefit from the expertise of the University faculty and the significant contributions the teacher candidates make to the school. The children in these schools benefit from the additional adult attention as well as from the enthusiasm and new learning strategies that teacher candidates often bring to the classroom as they prepare to become teachers.

West Virginia currently has license reciprocity with all states, exluding California, through NC-SARA.  Through NASDTEC 45 states have reciprocity with West Virginia (excludes Alaska, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin). Concord University's Educator Preparation Program (EPP)  is aligned with licensing requirements of West Virginia. If you intend to practice outside of West Virginia, please check with the appropriate state licensing body. Requirements for licensure vary from one profession to another and from state to state. 

Students seeking licensure in another state are advised to contact the appropriate licensing board in that state to determine specific requirements or guidelines for reciprocity as we are unable to determine if the program meets requirements for licensure in other U.S. states or protectorates. For a list of the state departments of education that oversee professional teaching licensure, see the U.S. Department of Education website - State Contacts page.

For questions related to licensure, please contact Ms. Kimberly Nichols, Concord University Department of Education Certification Coordinator.

The Department of Education provides a variety of measures to facilitate candidates’ successful performance including the following:

• Assignment of an appropriate advisor
• Special summer advising
• Report of mid-term grades
• Individual letters to candidates upon application and acceptance to the program
• Individual letters to candidates upon application and acceptance to student teaching
• Student teaching placement meetings provide for discussion and questions
• Exit interviews with student teachers identify program strengths and recommendations for program improvement

A variety of support services are available including the Concord Child Development Center, Student Support Services, Autism Center and the Financial Aid Office.

Graduation criteria include the completion of a minimum of 120 hours, the required GPAs, successful completion of all state-required tests, and the completion of all coursework to meet program certification requirements. Graduation with a Bachelor of Science degree in Education will not be granted unless a teacher candidate also satisfies all West Virginia teacher certification requirements, which includes a state and national background check.

As of January 1, 2002, all applicants for initial licensure must be fingerprinted and undergo state and federal background checks. Individuals convicted of a felony may not be eligible for certification to teach. Convicted felons should determine their eligibility for certification with the West Virginia Department of Education prior to entering the teacher education program.

Program Graduates

Graduates of our program have been recognized as outstanding teachers of the year, admitted to prominent graduate schools around the country, and have earned scholarships and internships with affiliate professional organizations. Graduates of Concord University’s Teacher Education Program are eligible for licensure in West Virginia, and in other states through reciprocal agreements. Concord University is accredited under the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education through the Council for the Accreditation of Education Preparation (CAEP) from 2014-2020. Additionally, all of the content specializations are recognized by the following specialized professional associations, and/or the West Virginia Board of Education: 

• Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI)
• Council for Exceptional Children (CEC)
• National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC)
• Society of Health and Physical Education (SHAPE)
• International Reading Association (IRA)
• Educational Leadership Constituent Council (ELCC)
• National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)
• National Science Teachers Association (NSTA)
• National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS)
• National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM)
• West Virginia Board of Education

Career Opportunities

• WVDE Employment Opportunities
• K12 Job Search
• Education America Network
• K12 Job Spot
• US Department fo State Office of Overseas Schools (international)
• Teacher Exchange Program (international)
• U.S. Peace Corp (international)
• Association of Christian Schools (international)
• Teach Abroad (international)
• Additional information here