This article is a commentary on the seven articles in this special issue of EJTE on teacher quality from international perspectives. In the article, Marilyn Cochran-Smith points to differences as well as common themes and details across the articles in the issue. The article discusses the emergence of teacher quality as a global concern, including…

This article explores how teacher education operates within market-organized environments. We argue that the forces of the market have acted "against institutional isomorphism" in teacher education, as evidenced by the emergence of new graduate schools of education (nGSEs), which are a new population of teacher preparation providers. We…

The relocation of teacher preparation to "new graduate schools of education" (nGSEs) is a highly controversial "innovation" within the rapidly expanding field of teacher education. This introductory article to a guest-edited issue of "The New Educator" focused on nGSEs defines teacher preparation at nGSEs and analyzes…

This article takes a multi-case perspective on teacher preparation at new graduate schools of education (nGSEs) across four sites. The article argues that teacher preparation at nGSEs is a study in contrasts. On one hand, nGSE leaders frame teacher preparation at their institutions in terms of the marked contrasts they perceive between their…

Based on a review of GPA and SAT/ACT requirements at 221 institutions in 25 states, a new report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) recommends that states, institutions of higher education, and the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) maintain or establish a higher bar for entry into teacher preparation…

Bellwether Education Partners' report, "A New Agenda," calls for a "rational" and "rigorous" research agenda for teacher education. Although the report's rationale is not fully explicated, it asserts that programs are "blindly swinging from one popular reform to the next" and that decades of input- and…

In 2010, as the result of a congressionally mandated study, the National Research Council (NRC) published the report "Preparing Teachers: Building Evidence for Sound Policy" (NRC, 2010). Reflecting the unprecedented attention to teacher quality that had emerged internationally in response to the exigencies of the "global knowledge…

Despite an increasing number of English-language learners (ELLs) in U.S. schools and a trend toward placing them in mainstream classrooms, relatively little attention has been paid to synthesizing and appraising the extant research on how future mainstream teachers are prepared to teach this student population. To shed light on this topic, the…

Despite a growing body of knowledge about what content, processes and arrangements for learning may result in more effective initial teacher education, there remains a problem with the variability of outcomes from teacher education programmes. This paper reports on a multi-perspective exploration of what influences learning to teach in valued ways…

This is the second of a two-part article intended to offer teacher educators a cohesive overview of the sprawling and uneven field of research on teacher preparation by identifying, analyzing, and critiquing its major programs. The article discusses research on teacher preparation for the knowledge society and research on teacher preparation for…

Many scholars have concluded that teacher education research needs to take a complex view, resist simplification, and account more fully for teacher education's contexts and processes as well as its impact on teacher candidates' and school students' learning (Cochran-Smith & Zeichner, 2005; Grossman & McDonald, 2008; Opfer & Pedder,…

Differential student achievement has particular significance in New Zealand as it has one of the largest gaps between high and low achievers among all OECD countries. Students from low socio-economic status (SES) communities, who are often Maori and Pasifika, are heavily over-represented in the low achieving group, while students from wealthier…

This article argues that research on teacher preparation over the last 100 years can be understood in terms of the major questions that researchers examined. The analysis is guided by the framework of "research as historically situated social practice," which emphasizes that researchers' interests, commitments, and social experiences…

This is the first of a two-part article that aims to chart the contemporary landscape of research on teacher preparation and certification. It is based on a review of more than 1,500 studies published between 2000 and 2012. Part 1 provides information about how the review was conducted and describes the theoretical/analytic framework the authors…

In this article the authors respond to Leah Wasburn-Moses's thoughtful response to their article, "Diversity in Teacher Education and Special Education: The Issues That Divide." In their article, the authors identified what they believe are fundamental differences in how dominant voices in the special education and general teacher education…