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Description & Background of ACE
WHAT?
| In a bid to ensure the fair and accountable implementation of The No Child Left Behind Act, faculty at Salisbury University and UMES submitted a grant proposal for a competitive National Professional Development Discretionary Grant opportunity. We were awarded funding to provide ESOL professional development in the form of the ACE Masters Program in TESOL. We proposed an extended program of study specifically designed to offer the: 1) Range, 2) Breadth and, 3) Depth of expertise needed to provide expert ESOL classroom teachers, ESOL Coordinators, and ESOL Assessment and Curriculum specialists for these counties. |
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The ACE model aims to:
1) Increase the quality and quantity of trained graduate-degree-holding ESOL professionals in the rural Eastern Shore
2) Improve routes of educational accessibility
3) Increase the number of ESOL experts from traditionally underrepresented social groups
4) Provide sound, novel pedagogical programs based on theoretical principles, and finally,
5) Ensure the equitable realization of Federal-LEP mandates in isolated rural counties.
WHERE?
Participants will come from eight of the most rapidly growing LEP rural counties on the Eastern Shore of Maryland:
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All five of the above mentioned counties have growth rates above 40.1% which is the state average for ESOL populations. For more information on ESOL statistics on the shore, see this Power Point presentation, [Power Point 2004 presentation ]compiled by Bob Hoffman.
HOW?
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The model of professional development being proposed is entitled, Accelerated Career Enhancement (ACE) Model, an accelerated Master’s in TESOL. Via a competitive application process, we will recruit qualified, licensed, classroom teachers, from various subject and grade levels into Salisbury University’s Master’s program in TESOL, offered specifically for these individuals at an accelerated rate. The aim is to provide the benefits of a concrete, high-incentive, long-term, 9-month niche-program targeted specifically at the rural needs of LEP K-12 school districts in the five counties. |
FACULTY: Faculty with a minimum of a doctorate in the area of Applied Linguistics, TESOL or Bilingual Education or other related areas at Salisbury University, The University of Maryland Eastern Shore, as well as other higher institutions across the state/country will be invited to teach courses. The aim is to provide the benefits of varied faculty expertise in the training of professionals in the rural counties of the Eastern shore.
WHEN?
The program will run every year and dependent on a renewal of funding is projected to run for five years. The next cohort will begin courses in January 2004 and complete their TESOL coursework by October 2004.
There will be between 12 - 18 participants per cohort (per project year). Note: In the event of either a reduced fiscal year budget or a large tuition increase, we may have to drop below 12 participants.
Scholarships include Tuition and Fees for 11 courses plus a stipend for books.
Also included is a substitute Teacher Payment for each participant for respective counties for course meetings held on weekdays in the program. This is in a bid to ensure that all participants have enough time to travel and be academically prepared for their course work. Other courses are on Weekends and during the summer months.
WHO? WHY THE ACE TESOL Degree?
ACE is filling a key gap in ESOL professional development. It is offering graduate-level ESOL expertise for classroom teachers from a variety of fields via an accelerated 11-month model, reaching the one population that no other scholarship program has targeted. The aim is to provide trained ESOL specialists sorely needed for the fair implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act in these counties. Aiming to increase professional expertise in the domains of: 1) Knowledge, 2) Efficiency, and 3) Expertise, the ACE Masters in TESOL operates on the Copernican model of education, a block-educational system in which courses are delivered in longer blocks of time than conventionally sequenced semester classes permitting for more intense continuous study and the eventual creation of a flexible expert. Via a series of 12 carefully designed, and methodically sequenced courses held at accessible times over a period of exactly 9 months, 12 already certified classroom teachers each year will obtain ESOL expertise in a variety of domains.
IS THE ACE TESOL Degree FOR YOU?
The chart below outlines three possible ways of accessing professional development and offers a comparative analysis using a number of criteria.
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TRADITIONAL MASTER’S PROGRAM |
ACCELERATED CAREER ENHANCEMENT (ACE) MASTER’S |
WORKSHOP/IN-SERVICE PROGRAM |
Curricular |
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1. Require full to part-time study for individuals who often have to attend day-time classes over traditionally held 15-week semester long periods, a tedious course of study often requiring an average yearly span of 2-3 years |
1. Flexible learning designed on an Anyplace-Anytime Paradigm catered specifically for classroom teachers, who can attend carefully planned month-long courses in an approved program of study and earn an equivalent degree in no more than 11 months. Additionally, the proposed ACE Master’s can also accelerate the process of licensure for classroom teachers with two or more years of foreign language and teaching experience since it fulfills all of the Maryland licensure requirements for ESOL. |
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Course Content |
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2. A course of study that has contact hour meetings either once, twice or three times a week in all of the designated course areas. However, the extended period of semester- long learning can get tedious and for most students can result in a loss of incentive with a consequent loss of connections between the areas of study, since there is a juggling of a number of courses, and consequently, divided attention between content areas. |
2. An in-depth, intensive study of course material with courses sequenced to build upon each other so that trainees are constantly reinforced with and reminded of the connections between subject areas. The content in the area of a Master’s in TESOL is particularly suitable for such intensive study since the content area assumes expert knowledge in the interdisciplinary areas of language teaching and second language learning. Students are presented with one course at a time, so they have full concentration on only one subject area at a time. |
2. A solution often designed to remedy the lack of skills of most classroom teachers via what are usually labeled “high- quality” workshops usually scheduled over a number of hours in which content about the structure of language, second language acquisition, and sociolinguistics, to name a few examples, are merely scratched. |
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TRADITIONAL MASTER’S PROGRAM |
ACCELERATED CAREER ENHANCEMENT (ACE) MASTER’S |
WORKSHOP/IN-SERVICE PROGRAM |
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PERSONAL BENEFITS |
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3. The long-term career benefits of such programs are often to instill a love of the field and in most cases prompt a desire for doctoral research and further study |
3. There is a high incentive to pursue a Masters degree since such an additional qualification in and of itself would lead to advantages for both the individual and the school system of which the individual is a part. For the rural- classroom teacher interested in career enhancement, content instruction has to be supplemented via long-term career ladder incentives, the type that would accrue from an additional Master’s Degree. |
3. Most of such required in-service workshops do not provide teachers with long- term career benefits, the kind of intellectual benefits that would accrue from say in-depth knowledge about second language learning such as the kind provided to students seeking graduate level specialization, or even utilitarian benefits of the kind afforded by a Master’s degree |
Benefits: Curricular |
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4. A model of education which as evinced in the catalogue mission statement of Graduate Study at Salisbury University[1] is designed to enhance critical introspection by encouraging students “to expand knowledge and facility in their respective fields of study, and to embrace an ethos dedicated to the continued acquisition of knowledge and the pursuit of the intellectual ideal.” |
4. The ACE Model of Masters degree education will replicate the same educational ideal though one can argue in a more intense fashion since students will be involved in critical introspection for a concentrated period of time. This model will encourage independent, creative, pragmatic thinking, the kind only possible at the Master’s level of education. The graduates of this program will be in a niche-program of study designed for the specific needs of LEP-rural based counties. |
4. This kind of education by comparison is a model that promotes dependence since mere introduction to crucial areas of expertise promotes both a sense of panic in individuals in their recognition of what still needs to be learned. Research has chronicled the “exceptionally high “ drop out rates of numerous LEP students unable to make sense of classroom content taught by panic-stricken professionally untrained teachers.[2] |
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Benefits: Socio-political |
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5. A Model of education that provides a workforce for a number of arenas. |
5. This model provides a Nurturing and nutured workforce. It is not a replacement model, but rather, an expansionist model via a program that provides incentives for school districts to promote self-sufficiency by exploiting the existent talent of existent-classroom teachers. |
Fosters a model of dependency on experts, rather than true educational empowerment, the kind that would come from obtaining a Master’s degree |
[1] Salisbury University: Undergraduate and Graduate Catalogue 2001-2003.
[2] Bennici, F. and Strang W.E. (1995). Special Issues Analysis Center, Annual Report, Year 3, Volume V: An Analysis of Language Minority and Limited English Proficient Students from NELS: 88 Rockville, MD: Westat, Inc.