Tech gets higher marks in latest Tennessee Educator Prep Report Card

Tennessee Tech continues to be one of the largest producers of teachers in the state of Tennessee.

COOKEVILLE – According to the latest Tennessee Educator Prep Report Card, Tennessee Tech is doing a great job of preparing graduates for teaching jobs around the state.

In a report published today by the Tennessee State Board of Education, Tech scored the highest possible on a four-point scale when it comes to employment. Tech’s rate of first-year employment in Tennessee public schools, rate of employment within three years in Tennessee public schools, and second-year retention rate were all above the state average.

“Historically, we have the largest number of school districts who hire our graduates throughout the state,” said Julie Baker, associate dean of Tech’s College of Education. “There were 78 different school districts that hired our graduates over the last three years. That is huge. Even the larger schools don’t come close to that. That says a lot about us.”

The report, which includes three years of data (2015-2016, 2016-2017, and 2017-2018), and ranks the 39 Educator Preparation Providers (EPPs) across the state, including public, private and for-profit institutions, showed Tech moving up in the overall performance category from a two to a three on the four-point scale. 

“We are excited that we had moved from a two to a three,” said Baker. “There’s not one particular metric that we increased significantly. We worked hard to improve in all the areas.”

Tech increased its percentage points in every indicator in the Provider Impact category to score a three out of four. Baker believes this number could increase even more.

“We know that we have a lot of graduates who go to graduate school, and many stay at Tech to attend graduate school. That hurts our percentages on this metric,” said Baker. “The graduates that count are the ones who get a job at a public school in the state of Tennessee. If we have a graduate who goes out of state or teaches at a private school, it counts against us. These numbers are just in Tennessee public schools.”

In the third category, Candidate Profile, Tech scored a one out of four. However, there was an increase of 10 percentage points in this category. Among the three indicators in this category — qualifying assessment scores, percentage of high demand endorsements, and percentage of racially diverse candidates — Tech continues to struggle with its percentage of diverse candidates.

“Our candidate profile is again our weakest performance category,” said Baker. “In the Upper Cumberland, our population is not racially diverse. We know we aren’t drawing from a racially diverse population. We are thinking outside the box to attract racially diverse candidates. We are working on that right now.”

Meanwhile, Tech continues to be one of the largest producers of teachers in the state of Tennessee. And those teachers from the College of Education are job-ready when they graduate.

“We have more partnerships in the state, and we also have more school districts that hire our candidates than any other EPP in the state. That is something we are definitely proud of,” said Baker. “We offer a lot of programs that many other universities don’t offer. We have ag education, family and consumer sciences, art education, music education and our physical education and exercise science program is one of the best in the state. 

“We have a lot to offer as an institution,” continued Baker. “It’s not just about numbers or in the curriculum. We put our teacher candidates first, and we want to see them succeed with future generations of P-12 students. Additionally, we work hard to build partnerships with many districts across the state. The Report Card is a positive reflection on the hard work and dedication of our graduates.”

To find out more about the state report card, log on to https://teacherprepreportcard.tn.gov/.

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