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Overview | Presenters

"Teachers are the lifeblood of our Nation's classrooms. These committed and dedicated professionals are helping to shape our children's future and our future. For that we owe them our highest regard, our highest respect."—Laura Bush

Overview

As part of her Ready to Read, Ready to Learn initiative, Laura Bush is hosting the White House Conference on Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers on Tuesday, March 5, 2002. Just as children need to be ready to learn to read when they enter school, teachers need to be ready to teach when they enter the classroom. The Conference brings together university and business leaders, teacher education advocates, teachers' unions, public policy organizations, and foundations from across the country, and it will help develop solutions for enhancing teacher quality.

The goal of this Conference is to ensure that our nation's children can count on having teachers who not only bring love, compassion, and dedication to their profession, but also possess:

• A deep and up-to-date knowledge of the concepts and subjects they are teaching; and
• The ability to assess each student's academic strengths and weaknesses and to apply the most effective instructional methods, strategies, and materials to meet his or her learning needs.

The Conference focuses on two major areas of teacher instruction: preparation at the nation's colleges of education for teacher candidates and professional development for those teachers who have already answered the call to teach. It also highlights research regarding teacher preparation and student achievement. Presentations will showcase innovative and successful teacher training and recruitment programs that help bring the best and the brightest to our nation's classrooms, especially to those in our neediest neighborhoods.

Research shows that children learn and achieve at much higher levels when their teachers know the subject content thoroughly and know how to teach it effectively. Good teachers monitor the progress of their students and adjust instruction for students who are falling behind.

With this in mind, Laura Bush and the Bush Administration are committed to encouraging schools of education, school districts and other learning institutions to significantly strengthen their teacher training programs.

Presenters

Moderator
The Honorable Margaret Spellings
Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy
The White House

Laura Bush

What We Know and Where We Need to Go

The Honorable Grover (Russ) Whitehurst, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
Assistant Secretary
Office of Educational Research and Improvement
Department of Education

Diane Ravitch, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
Research Professor of Education
New York University

Frederick M. Hess, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
Assistant Professor of Education and Government
University of Virginia

Promising Practices

Manuel J. Justiz, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
Dean of Education
University of Texas at Austin

David W. Gordon [ Brief bio ]
Superintendent
Elk Grove Unified School District
Elk Grove, California

View From The American Federation of Teachers

Sandra Feldman [ Brief bio ]
President
American Federation of Teachers

BREAK

Spotlight on Teaching Reading

Edward J. Kame'enui, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
Director
Institute for the Development of Educational Achievement
University of Oregon

Teacher Certification Issues

Barbara B. Kelley [ Brief bio ]
Chair
National Board for Professional Teaching Standards

Michael B. Poliakoff, Ph.D. [ Brief bio ]
President
National Council on Teacher Quality

Promising Practices in Alternative Routes to Teaching

Arthur Moore [ Brief bio ]
Elementary Special Education Teacher
Baltimore City Schools
Troops to Teachers

Aramina Ferrer [ Brief bio ]
Principal
The Edgar Allan Poe Literacy Development School
Bronx, New York
New Teacher Project

Elizabeth Menendez [ Brief bio ]
Elementary Teacher
New York City Schools
Teach for America

Closing Remarks

The Honorable Rod Paige, Ed.D.
Secretary of Education

Luncheon

Remarks by the President

Presenters' Biographies

Sandra Feldman is President of the 1.2 million member American Federation of Teachers. She is also a member of the Executive Council of the AFL-CIO and is Vice President of Education International, a worldwide organization of teacher organizations. A native of New York City, Ms. Feldman was educated in public schools and holds a master's degree in English Literature from New York University. She is a former teacher, a widely recognized authority on urban education, and an advocate for children.

Aramina Ferrer is Principal of P.S. 46, The Edgar Allan Poe Literacy Development School in the Bronx, New York. She is a former second language teacher and supervised programs in the junior high schools in Community School District 10. Ms. Ferrer serves as a member of the Board of Managers of the New York Botanical Garden, Trustee of the New York Historical Society and a member of the Board of Directors of New York State Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Among her numerous awards, she has received the Network of Bronx Women Senior Laureate Award and the Governor's Outstanding Hispanic Women Achievers Award.

David W. Gordon has served as Superintendent of the Elk Grove Unified School District since 1995. Elk Grove is an ethnically and socioeconomically diverse district of southern Sacramento County, California. Prior to becoming Superintendent, he served as Assistant Superintendent of Elementary Education for the district and worked as Deputy Superintendent of the California State Department of Education. He began his career as an elementary teacher in the South Bronx, New York. Mr. Gordon holds a B.A. degree from Brandeis University and received his Master of Education and Certificate of Advanced Study in Educational Administration from Harvard University. He has served on and led numerous state advisory panels on teacher and administrator training and certification. Mr. Gordon has been appointed by President Bush to the President's Commission on Excellence in Special Education.

Frederick M. Hess, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Education and Government at the University of Virginia. Dr. Hess's books include Spinning Wheels: The Politics of Urban School Reform, Bringing the Social Sciences Alive, and Revolution at the Margins: The Impact of Competition on Urban School Systems. He is executive editor of Education Next and a member of both the National Working Commission on Choice in K-12 Education and the Nominations Committee for the Broad Prize for Urban Education. A former high school social studies teacher, Dr. Hess holds an M.Ed. in Education and an M.A. and Ph.D. in government from Harvard University.

Manuel J. Justiz, Ph.D., former Director of the National Institute of Education, has been Dean of the College of Education at The University of Texas at Austin since 1990. Under his leadership, the college rose to seventh in the 2002 U.S. News and World Report rankings of the nation's top public graduate schools of education. He holds the A. M. Aikin Regents Chair in Education Leadership and the Lee Hage Jamail Regents Chair in Education. Dr. Justiz holds a B.A. in political science and an M.A. in education from Emporia State University and earned a doctorate in higher education administration from Southern Illinois University.

Edward J. Kame'enui, Ph.D., is currently Professor and Director of the Institute for the Development of Educational Achievement (IDEA) in the College of Education at the University of Oregon. He was born in Hilo, Hawaii, grew up in Honolulu, and attended the Kamehameha Schools, a school for children of Hawaiian ancestry only. He was one of 17 researchers selected to serve on the National Research Council's (National Academy of Sciences) Committee on the Prevention of Reading Difficulties in Young Children.

Barbara B. Kelley is an elementary education teacher at Vine Street School in Bangor, Maine. In 1997, she became the first teacher to chair the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, succeeding founding chair Governor Jim Hunt of North Carolina. This is her tenth year on the Board, including a two-year term as vice-chair. In 1999, Teacher Magazine named her one of ten people who shaped the decade in American education.

Elizabeth Menendez graduated from the University of Maryland in 1995 with a bachelors degree in English literature. She joined the ranks of Teach For America in 1996 and began her teaching career in New York City in an elementary school in the Bronx. Elizabeth continues to teach in New York City and has taught several elementary grades since she began teaching in 1996. She has also earned her masters of education from Mercy College in New York and continues to take additional education courses at Teachers College at Columbia University.

Arthur Moore is a special education teacher in the Baltimore City Public School System. He retired as United States Army Staff Sergeant after serving 21 years and has spent the last seven years working as an educator in Baltimore. He received his bachelor's degree in Business Administration from National College in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and his masters in special education from Coppin State College in Baltimore, Maryland.

Michael B. Poliakoff, Ph.D., is the President of the National Council on Teacher Quality. Previously, he served as Pennsylvania's Deputy Secretary for Postsecondary and Higher Education. Dr. Poliakoff helped develop higher standards for teacher preparation and certification, an alternative certification system, and the Governor's Institutes for Teachers.

Diane Ravitch, Ph.D., is a leading historian of education. She is Research Professor of Education at New York University and Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. She is the author of 18 books and hundreds of articles. Dr. Ravitch was Assistant Secretary of Education for the Office of Research and Information in the administration of President George H. W. Bush. She earned a B.A. from Wellesley College in 1960 and a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University in 1975.

Grover (Russ) Whitehurst, Ph.D., is Assistant Secretary for Research and Improvement in the Department of Education. Previously, Dr. Whitehurst was Leading Professor of Psychology and Pediatrics, and Chairman of the Department of Psychology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He has published more than 100 scholarly papers on language and pre-reading development in preschool children. One of the goals of his work has been to develop techniques and materials that can be used by parents and teachers to enhance children's readiness for school. He received his undergraduate degree at East Carolina University and obtained his doctorate in experimental child psychology from the University of Illinois.

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