Program Theme
Teaching Toward a Better World: Embracing the Challenges
Teaching is a service that changes students’ lives. However, teaching in today’s public schools can be a daunting task, given the massive scope of a teacher’s responsibility and impact on others. The greatest strength of K–12 schools is the remarkable teachers who create effective learning environments for their students despite the growing number of challenges with which they are confronted. These challenges during times of turmoil and change give us the impetus to look within ourselves and at the world once more in order to more fully recognize the values and aspirations that will help us prepare children and youth to participate in the world. Hope for a better society is—more than ever—dependent on good education. The time is right to carefully consider and act on our deepest educational values.
Evergreen’s MIT program is inspired by the belief that the foundation of learning in a democracy should be to understand and respond to an individual’s talents, interests and needs while supporting the interests and needs of the community. Genuine caring for the all-around welfare of others is embraced as a guiding educational value in our program as we prepare teachers to facilitate academic learning, teach for social justice, and prepare students to live in a democracy. We take seriously the charge from the state of Washington to prepare highly competent teachers, able to use what they know about learning, development, communication and diverse learners to inform their teaching, and place learning in a social context.
This demanding program will prepare you as a future teacher to engage in reflective practice in order to support the learning of diverse students. You will learn what is involved in supporting the development of students’ knowledge and skills in the specific area(s) you plan to teach. In your work with children and youth, you will learn to take into account cognitive, social and emotional development, cultural context, motivation and recent research on teaching and learning.
