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THE COMMUNITY COLLEGEROLE IN PREPARING FUTURETEACHERS: THE IMPACT OFA MENTORING PROGRAM FORPRESERVICE TEACHERSRosemary Woullard a & Linda T. Coats ba Pearl River Community College , Poplarville,Mississippi, USAb Mississippi State University , Mississippi, MississippiState, USAPublished online: 17 Aug 2010.
To cite this article: Rosemary Woullard & Linda T. Coats (2004) THE COMMUNITYCOLLEGE ROLE IN PREPARING FUTURE TEACHERS: THE IMPACT OF A MENTORINGPROGRAM FOR PRESERVICE TEACHERS, Community College Journal of Research andPractice, 28:7, 609-624
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10668920490467251
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THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE ROLE IN PREPARINGFUTURE TEACHERS: THE IMPACT OF A MENTORINGPROGRAM FOR PRESERVICE TEACHERS
Rosemary WoullardPearl River Community College, Poplarville,Mississippi, USA
Linda T. CoatsMississippi State University, Mississippi State,Mississippi, USA
The imminent teacher shortage in the United States has caused educators, policymakers, parents and concerned citizens to focus on teacher preparation not only atthe university level, but also at the community college level. As a result, manycommunity colleges are developing teacher education programs and focusing onreal life classroom situations for early field experiences. Mentoring, one of the mostpopular ways of benefiting from the positive influence of a more experiencedperson, is an approach to preparing teachers for educational occupations.
The main objective of this study was to see if a preservice mentoring programcan affect changes in the emotions, attitudes, and anxieties of students about theteaching profession. The participants were 60 education majors (30 inthe experimental group and 30 in the control group) from a community college. Theexperimental group had first-hand experiences with 30 master teachers from alocal school district. The 30 students in the control group were education majorsfrom the community college who completed a pre- and posttest instrument. Datawas collected from results of a pre- and posttest of a teaching attitudinal survey forpreservice teachers. An analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was performed to test forsignificant differences between the means of the posttests for the control andexperimental groups while controlling for the pretests. Results revealed that therewere no statistically significant differences between the means of the two groupswith respect to changes in emotions and anxiety. However, there was a statisticallysignificant difference between the two groups in attitudinal changes.
In the past, the United States has been able to produce an adequatesupply of teachers to meet its educational demands. For generations,four-year colleges and universities have been charged with the
Address correspondence to Linda T. Coats, Mississippi State University, Box 9705,Mississippi State, MS 39762. E-mail: [email protected]
Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 28: 609–624, 2004
Copyright # Taylor & Francis Inc.
ISSN: 1066-8926 print/1521-0413 online
DOI: 10.1080/10668920490467251
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responsibility of producing qualified teachers who can effectively meetthe challenges of the classroom. However, because of a projectedincrease in student enrollment, high teacher attrition rates, low tea-cher salaries, teacher accountability, changing classroom dynamics,and increased teaching workloads, in as little as seven years thiscountry will not have enough teachers to fill our schools (EducationWeek, 2001). Many states are already feeling the crunch and aretaking action to prevent an educational crisis that could result from asevere shortage of teachers.
According to Yasin (2000), the number of public elementary andsecondary school teachers has continued to grow for the last tenyears. Synder (1999) reports that there are about 3.1 million teachersin the United States. Around 2,666,000 of this number teach inpublic elementary and secondary schools while 400,000 teach inprivate elementary and secondary schools. This is a significantincrease over the last few years. By the year 2008, the number ofteachers will increase to 3.46 million while the elementary and sec-ondary student enrollment will increase to 54.27 million. Gerald andHussar (1998) claim that these figures indicate that in a few yearsmore teachers will be needed than are being prepared to enter theclassrooms.
The National Education Association (NEA) has determined that 6%of the nation’s teaching force leaves the profession, and more than 7%change schools each year. Additionally, 20% of all newly hired teachersleave within three years because they are not properly prepared forthe realities of the classroom. ‘‘In urban districts, close to 50% ofnewcomers flee the profession during their first five years of teaching’’(NEA, 1999, p. 3). It is also interesting to note that while the studentpopulation is becoming more multi-cultural and multi-ethnic, theteachers who teach them are not. Around 87�90% of U. S. teachers arewhite females while only 11% are teachers of color. African Americansmake up 6.9% of the teaching population and Hispanics=Latino, alongwith other minorities, account for 3.5%. In contrast to this fact,African American, Hispanic=Latino, Asian, and Native American chil-dren make up 36% of the student population, a percentage that in-creases each passing year (Community College Network (CCN), 2000).
According to The Community College Policy Center (‘‘Policy Issue,’’2002) some states such as Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois,Maryland, and Texas are already suffering from teacher shortages andhave begun meeting the challenge of this new role for their communitycolleges by ‘‘growing their own’’ teachers=educators. In Arizona, RioSalado College offers the first on-line based teacher certification pro-gram for perspective K-12 teachers in the United States.
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In Mississippi 63% of the state’s college students are enrolled in its15 community colleges. Thirty-two percent of these studentsare minorities. The Mississippi Association of Community and JuniorCollege (MACJC) has responded with a Teacher Preparation Initia-tive. This initiative contains nine task forces concerning recruitment,curriculum planning, prospective teachers, retention, professionaldevelopment, collaboration, faculty-in-residence, spring colloquium,and Praxis I (MACJC, 2001).
In the late 1990s, the Mississippi Department of Education reporteda shortage of some 700 teachers. The state began to take action byenacting The Mississippi Critical Teacher Shortage Act to offset themore severe crisis expected in the next five years. The MississippiCritical Shortage Act of 1998 was enacted to address the seriousproblem of teacher shortages. In 2000, the act was revised to includeteacher incentives and recruitment tools to attract qualified teachercandidates to specific geographic areas of the state. Certain areas ofthe state suffer disproportionally from a lack of qualified educatorsand are eligible for critical teacher shortage funds established by thestate. One of the most critical areas is the Delta region (MississippiCritical Shortage Act, 2000). The new federal government legislationthat has come from President’s Bush’s No Child Left Behind Actfocuses on the importance of having qualified teachers in each class-room. One of the key requirements outlined in Title II, Part A of thereport states that all teachers must be highly qualified by the end ofthe 2005�2006 school year.
Because of such a severe teacher shortage, some states legislatorshave officially recognized community colleges as institutions to pre-pare students for teaching careers. The Mississippi Association forCommunity and Junior Colleges (MACJC) points out that this is a rolefor which the community college is naturally fitted. Community col-leges enroll more than 44% of undergraduates in the nation (MACJC,2001). Community colleges also enroll 42% of all African Americancollege students and 55% of all Hispanic students in higher education(Waiwaiole & Boswell, 2001). Generally community colleges prepareeducation majors with core courses, before they transfer to four-yearinstitutions. When these students transfer to a four-year institution,they enter a teacher preparation program for the first time. Commu-nity college students are not generally exposed to any field experiencesnor are they placed in the proximity of any practical K-12 teachingsituations. There are, however, some states that have formed com-munity college teacher preparation programs. In most of these statesthough, there have been no planned community college involvement atthe state or local level (MACJC, 2001). Because these community
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college teacher preparation programs are not widespread, there hasbeen little research conducted to discover the effects of such programson community college freshmen and sophomores.
The state’s goal is to assist in recruiting, preparing, retaining, andproviding staff development for Mississippi teachers. The state wantsto ensure that teachers enter the classroom well prepared to teach.MACJC (2001) suggests collaborations between four-year colleges=universities and the community colleges while using mentoring,practicum in K-12 settings, and future teachers’ clubs as differentmeans of reaching this goal. Also in Mississippi, the recent legisla-tion that requires all assistant teachers in the state to have anassociate’s degree is putting pressure on the 15 community collegesin the state. These assistant teachers will likely attend communitycolleges to get those degrees. These colleges must either expand theirteacher preparation programs if they already have them or imple-ment such programs if they do not. Because this role is essentiallynew to the community colleges in Mississippi, there is little, if any,published research on teacher preparation at the community collegelevel.
Big Brothers=Big Sisters of America offer a practical example ofeffective mentoring that school systems across the nation are quick toimitate. Studies of mentoring programs as a training technique forrecruiting and retaining teachers offer solutions to the teachershortage problem. Feiman-Nemser (1996) sees mentoring as a criticaltopic in education today. Mentoring is the favored strategy in U. S.policy initiatives that focuses on teacher training and induction.However, there are other important factors that should be studiedwhen considering teacher preparation programs. Factors as thenecessity of early field experiences (Huling, 2001), exposure to hands-on teaching experiences (Harris & Hodges, 1995), and the preserviceteacher’s anxiety and attitude about the profession are all importantto the development of good quality teachers (Fish, 1986; Gardner &Leak, 1994; Kobella, 1989).
Huling (2001) asserts that the idea of providing early field experi-ences through mentoring programs at the community college level isvital to teacher retention and teacher success. Huling defines earlyfield experiences as those experiences prior to student teaching.A wide variety of early field experiences provide an environment forexperimental training of teachers. Huling (2001) further adds thatincreased amounts of field experiences yield a more comfortablebeginning teacher who is more likely to remain in the classroom.
Another important factor in mentoring programs is the frameworkor theory that the mentoring teacher (master teacher) passes on to
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the mentored preservice teacher and the novice teacher. Many pre-service teachers learn from college faculty who follow the con-structivist theory (Savitz, 1999; Stuart & Thurlow, 2000) whileothers may learn from college faculty who follow the objectivisttheory. A constructivist is one who focuses on the process of buildingknowledge instead of the final product or outcome of a skill orbehavior (Harris & Hodges, 1995) . On the other hand, the objectivistfocuses on the final product or the outcome of the learning experi-ence. What is important to many traditional objectivist teachers isthe knowledge received as a final product or an outcome of anactivity. With constructivism, the focus shifts from the teacher (themaster teacher) to the student (the preservice teacher), and theclassroom becomes a place of active learning, where the studentconstructs knowledge while interacting with peers and adults(Lenski, Wham, & Griffey, 1998). Lenski et al. also point out that‘‘the principles of constructivism are fundamental to good teachingand provide a framework for developmentally appropriate practice inschools’’ (p. 227). Constructivist practices encourage preserviceteachers to build on their own knowledge about the experience ofteaching and discover the best ways to teach and the best waysstudents can learn. The constructivist theory seems to be the mostpopular theory used today to prepare teachers for the classroom.
The demands associated with teaching are primary sources of stressand anxiety (Fish, 1986; Gardner & Leak, 1994). For the most part,preservice and beginning teachers have no idea about the demandsthat will be placed on them and are unaware of the stress that comeswith the job. The master teacher’s anxiety and attitude toward the jobdirectly influence the preservice teacher’s anxiety and ultimate atti-tude about the teaching profession (Woolley, Woolley, & Hosey, 1999).
Finally, anxieties are fear factors that play an important role in theteaching profession as they do in any other occupation. Teaching anxi-eties help preservice teachers to recognize their favorable or unfavor-able feelings toward the teaching profession. In other words, preserviceteachers examine their attitudes about teaching (Fish, 1986; Gardner &Leak, 1994). Kobella (1989) asserts that attitudes can be taught becausethey are learned actively or randomly. Thus attitudes are related toone’s personal and social behaviors as well as one’s cognitive differences.As a result, attitudes can be changed. The master teacher passes ontheories of teaching to the preservice teacher engaged in mentoring.
The purpose of this study was to determine if a preservice teachermentoring program can affect changes in the emotions, attitudes, andanxieties that community college education majors have aboutteaching. The study investigated the initial emotional responses,
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attitudes, and anxieties as measured before the preservice teachingexperience using the Teaching Anxiety Scale Questionnaire (TCHAS)(Parsons, 1972).
Low salaries, increased workload, increasing enrollment, and lackof practical classroom experience are adding to the current teachershortage, making careers in the teaching profession unattractive tocollege graduates. Hanley (1994) concluded that those students who dodeclare education as their major, enter college planning to go intoteaching because they love children. They want to contribute in apositive way to their community, and they have this yearning to helppeople become better individuals. Often the love for children and thedesire to help them do not refer to children in typically diverseclassrooms. New teachers do not know what to expect once they are inthe classroom. A challenge of today’s teacher preparation programs isto prepare teacher education candidates who can be effective teachersin contemporary classrooms (Hanley, 1994). As a result, many school-college partnerships are forming to support professional developmentfor preservice and beginning teachers.
Many school-college partnerships use mentoring as early fieldexperiences for teacher education candidates. Mentoring on the pre-service level can give teacher education candidates opportunities towork closely with experienced teachers, hoping that the experiencedteacher will model good teaching skills. It is this kind of mentoring thatwill help teacher education candidates experience new pedagogies,classroom management, professional competency, and the realities ofthe classroom (Huling, 2001). Teacher education candidates often donot realize that teaching is a demanding job until they enter theclassroom as beginning teachers. Thus, the high attrition rate in thefirst three years of teaching adds to the growing teacher shortage.There is much more involved in effective and quality teaching thanmost new teachers realize. It requires commitment, dedication, and asHuling (2001) states, ‘‘more rigorous preparation and authenticexperiences to enable students to cope with the increasing complexities,challenges and diversities of current schools and classrooms’’ (p. 2).
Can a mentoring program in an early field experience affect changein emotional responses, anxiety, and attitude about the teaching pro-fession? This is the central issue discussed in this study.
METHOD
In this study a quasi-experimental research design was used. A quasi-experimental design has the appearance of a pretest-posttest rando-mized experiment but lacks random assignment (Babbie, 2001).
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According to the nonequivalent groups design, the study involvedtwo groups, experimental and control. Each group was measured witha pretest, The Teaching Anxiety Scale (TCHAS; Parsons, 1972), andafter the experimental group performed preservice teaching duties,each group was measured by a posttest over a period of six weeks. Theanalysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used as a statistical method toestimate the difference between the two groups on the posttest afteradjusting for the differences on the pretest.
INSTRUMENTATION
The instrument used in the study was The Teaching Anxiety Scale(TCHAS), authored by Parsons (1972) from the University of Texas atAustin. It was initially developed at Stanford University for useamong preservice and intern teachers. The design for this test camefrom studies that showed situation specific measures of anxiety maybe better indicators of specific behaviors that can impair performancein a variety of tasks including the impairment of teaching perfor-mance. Thus TCHAS was designed to provide a tool for measuringanxiety specific to the task of teaching.
The test contains a variety of self-report statements about teacherreactions to teaching. The items are designed to measure three out-comes: (a) emotional responses to a variety of different situationsrelated to teaching (items 1, 4, and 6), (b) attitudes toward teaching asa profession (items 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, and 9), and (c) the overall anxietiesabout the teaching profession (items 10�28) (Parsons, 1972). The testconsists of 28 questions that utilize a Likert-type scale. All the state-ments have 1 through 5 choices from low agreement to high agreementwith middle choice options of ‘‘infrequently,’’ ‘‘occasionally,’’ and ‘‘fre-quently,’’ respectively. Half of the items are phrased negatively interms of admission of anxiety, and the other items are phrased posi-tively. A high degree of agreement with negatively phrased items isscored ‘‘high anxious’’ while a high degree of agreement with positivelyphrased items is scored ‘‘low anxious.’’ The use of this test is restrictedto research questions and is not recommended for use in selecting orevaluating individual teachers (Parsons, 1972).
The TCHAS is designed to measure specific teaching anxiety andcan be easily scored. The TCHAS has a high reliability level with thealpha coefficients of .95 and an internal consistency ranging from .87to .94. This test significantly correlates with other tests that measureanxiety. The stability of the TCHAS is represented by a .95 PearsonProduct Moment test-retest correlation. The assumption for this
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correlation is that nothing will occur in the lives of the test takersbetween the pre- and posttests situations which would change atti-tudes toward teaching (Parsons, 1972). The test was used as a pretestto assess the emotional responses, attitudes, and anxieties associatedwith the teaching profession and again as the posttest to see if therewas a difference between the two tests.
PARTICIPANTS
The participants involved in this study were community college stu-dents registered in general education core classes at a communitycollege in a southeastern state. The students were freshman andsophomore education majors. This study placed these students in twogroups: the experimental group and the control group. There were 30students in the experimental group and 30 students in the controlgroup. The target student population in this study was the educationmajor who actively participated in a mentoring project (the experi-mental group) and the education major who participated in the studyas a part of the control group. Advertisements, interviews, andapplications were used to select the participants for the experimentalgroup, and the control group was selected from education classes oncampus.
PROCEDURE
Freshman and sophomore education majors were chosen for the studyupon their response to advertisements about the study during regis-tration for the spring semester. The students in the experimentalgroup completed applications, turned in three letters of recommen-dations, and were interviewed by the researchers. Thirty studentswere chosen to perform as preservice teachers and receive tuition forthe semester. The control group was chosen from the education classeson campus. These students were administered the pretest and theposttest during their class time. During the first meeting, students inthe experimental group attended an orientation and were asked tosign an informed consent form. They were administered a pretestsurvey and were informed of their part in the study. The control groupmembers did not have any stimulation outside of their regularscheduled classes and signed consent forms before taking the pre- andposttests surveys. The preservice teachers in the experimental groupwent to two local elementary schools five hours a week, performedpreservice teachers’ duties, and received tuition money. Theycompleted applications, criminal background forms, and attended a
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mentoring workshop with thirty master teachers (veteran certifiedteachers from the two elementary schools).
For six weeks, each member of the experimental group (preserviceteachers) was assigned to a master teacher. These preservice teachersperformed several activities:
1. Week one: The experimental group members attended a mentoringworkshop with their assigned master teachers, observed in theclassrooms, and was assigned a student to mentor.
2. Week two: Preservice teachers worked with the master teacher toprepare lesson plans for the mentored student and the entire class.The preservice teacher interacted with the entire class.
3. Week three: Preservice teachers worked with the master teacherto present at least one lesson for the remaining part of the study.
4. Week four: Preservice teachers continued planning lessons, men-toring, and interacting with the entire class.
5. Week five: The preservice teachers planned and attended, with themaster teachers, a conference with the mentored students’ parents.
6. Week six: The preservice teachers continued to present one or twolessons to the entire class and to work with the mentored students.Posttests, final surveys, and interviews were done.
RESULTS
Emotional change was measured by item #1, I am concerned aboutstandards and regulations set for teachers; item #4, I am concernedabout maintaining the appropriate degree of class control; and item #6,I am concerned about feeling more adequate as a teacher. The low scoreis the better score in this case. Posttests were analyzed with an ana-lysis of covariance in order to adjust for any group differences on thepretests. Descriptive statistics for emotion scores are shown in Table 1.
These data show that the emotional levels for both groups werelower from pretest to posttest. Data show both groups gained a certainamount of composure about teaching [combined group pretest mean(M¼ 5.9), and combined group posttest mean (M¼ 5.42)]. It can be
TABLE 1 Descriptive Statistics for Emotion
Group N Pre mean SD Post mean SD Adjusted mean
Experimental 30 6.23 2.13 5.57 2.27 5.38Control 30 5.57 2.21 5.27 1.72 5.455Total 60 5.9 4.34 5.42 3.99
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said that the experimental group entered the program at a slightlyhigher emotional level than the control group [experimental grouppretest mean (M¼ 6.29), control group pretest mean (M¼ 5.57)]. Atthe end of the study, while the experimental group became less emo-tional, they were still slightly more emotional than the control group[experimental group posttest mean (M¼ 5.57), control group posttestmean (M¼ 5.27)].
The analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) for the posttest showed thatthe scores for the experimental group were not significantly differentfrom the control group, F (1, 57)¼ .024, p< .05. These results areshown in Table 2.
Attitudinal change was measured by item #2, I am concerned aboutadapting myself to the needs of different students; item #3, I amconcerned about motivating students to study; item #5, I am concernedabout instilling worthwhile concepts and values; item #7, I am con-cerned about increasing students’ feelings of accomplishment; item #8,I am concerned about slow progress of certain pupils; and item #9,I am concerned about selecting and teaching content well. Descriptivestatistics for attitudes are in Table 3. These data show that scores forboth groups improved from pretest to posttest and that the adjustedmean from the experimental group was lower than that of the controlgroup.
Both groups showed a significant change in attitude towardteaching with a lower combined posttest mean (M¼ 12.43) whencompared to the combined pretest mean (M¼ 13.33). The experimentalgroup showed a greater change from the pretest (M¼ 12.73) to theposttest (M¼ 11.40). The control group showed some change with apretest mean of 13.93 decreasing to a posttest mean of 13.47.
The analysis of covariance for the posttest showed that the scoresfor the experimental group were significantly different from thecontrol group with the experimental group scores being lower, (F(1,57)¼ 4.038, p¼ 0.049). Therefore, the experimental procedure didcause the experimental group to demonstrate a significantly better
TABLE 2 ANCOVA for Emotion
Source SS df MS F
Pretest 32.18 1 32.182 8.97Group 087 1 087 024*Error 204.583 57 3.584Total 236.583 59
*p< .05.
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attitude toward teaching than the control group. These results areshown in Table 4.
Descriptive statistics show that anxiety levels as measured by theposttests declined for both the experimental and the control groupswhen compared to anxiety levels as measured by the pretests. Thesedata are shown in Table 5.
Both the experimental and control groups showed a decrease inoverall anxiety toward teaching with a combined pretest mean of 64.85decreasing to 60.80. Again the experimental group experienced greaterchange with the pretest mean of 63.73 decreasing to the posttest meanof 58.50. The control group experienced less change with the pretestmean of 65.97 decreasing to the posttest mean of 63.10.
Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) for the posttests showed thatscores for the experiment group were not statistically different fromthe control group, (F(1, 57)¼ 2.098, p¼ 0.153). Table 6 indicates thatthe experimental group anxiety posttest mean was 58.50 and thecontrol group anxiety posttest mean was 63.10.
FINDINGS
The experimental group’s scores showed a change within the group asa result of exposure to the treatment. The experimental group’s meanscores lowered as a result of the exposure, which is interpreted as lessemotional stress. The control group also showed a lowering of scores in
TABLE 3 Descriptive Statistics for Attitude Toward Teaching
Group N Pre mean SD Post mean SD Adjusted mean
Experimental 30 12.73 3.30 11.40 3.11 11.740Control 30 13.93 3.37 13.47 3.33 13.127Total 60 13.33 3.34 12.43 3.36 12.54
TABLE 4 ANCOVA for Attitudes Toward Teaching
Source SS df MS F
Pretest (cov) 244.73 1 244.73 35.397Group 27.918 1 27.918 4.0388Error 394.085 57 6.914Total 666.733 60
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the posttest, however, there was greater change in the experimentalgroup. The experimental group’s scores showed a change within thegroup as a result of exposure to the treatment. The experimental groupmean scores lowered as a result of the exposure, which is interpreted asa better attitude toward teaching. The control group also showed alowering of scores in the posttest, however, there was greater change inthe experimental group. There was a significant difference in theattitude toward teaching responses of the experimental and controlgroups.
The experimental group’s scores showed a change within the groupas a result of exposure to the treatment. The experimental group’smean scores lowered as a result of the exposure, which is interpretedas lower levels of anxiety. The control group also showed a lowering ofscores in the posttest; however, there was greater change in theexperimental group.
IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE
There were many outside factors which were not controlled, or fac-tored into, the analysis. Examples of these are maturity levels of thegroup participants on both sides of the exposure, outside factors orproblems in the home lives of each individual participant, and perso-nal motivation.
Results from this study indicate that changes do occur in educationstudents’ emotions, attitudes, and anxieties when they are placed in
TABLE 6 ANCOVA for Anxiety
Source SS df Mean square F
Pretest 5984.034 1 5984.034 95.902Group 130.906 1 130.906 2.098Error 3556.660 57 62.398Corrected 236.906 59
TABLE 5 Descriptive Statistics for Anxiety
Group N Pre mean SD Post mean SD Adjusted mean
Experimental 30 63.73 13.87 58.50 11.39 59.32Control 30 65.97 13.43 63.10 13.88 62.28Total 60 64.85 13.58 60.80 12.80 60.85
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direct proximity to their chosen profession early in their college career.The findings of this study imply that whether or not these studentscontinue to pursue the teaching profession, the first-hand experiencethey receive is valuable toward solidifying their decision about theircareer choices and may in effect yield and retain more qualified tea-chers in the classrooms.
Maryland, Florida, Texas, California, Illinois, and some otherstates have already begun to address their teacher shortage pro-blems through their use of the community college institutions. Thisstudy further implies that the state where this study was con-ducted, while it seeks how to solve its teacher shortage problem,should look at such mentoring programs and partnerships with thecommunity colleges and its local school districts for solutions. Thecontrol group, having no exposure to the preservice teachingexperience, answered the pre- and posttest questions with neitherexplanation nor reason to develop a change in attitude towardteaching, emotional level, or anxiety level. Without said exposure,on what basis did they justify their answers? They were, in effect,answering the test items in ignorance. The experimental group, onthe other hand, had a tangible basis for their changes in anxietylevel. The maturity levels of the participants also should be con-sidered, both upon entering and completing the study. More feed-back should be given to the students during the preservice teachingexperience. This allows for the development of confidence in theirperformance as a future teacher.
RECOMMENDATIONS
The main issue addressed in this study is one of major importance tothe survival of education in our state. Thus, it is recommended thatthis study be replicated. The findings of the study suggest that com-munity colleges should consider mentoring as a model for developingpreservice teacher preparation programs. This mirrors the findings ofLittle (1990) and Manzo (2003). Little (1990) focused on mentoringprograms in a four-year institution; Manzo (2003) and this studyfocused on mentoring in the community college education program.This movement toward teacher education programs and mentoring incommunity colleges allows students to make better-informed lifedecisions about their careers.
Another recommendation is that all college education programs useearly field experiences as a method of teacher preparation andpotential recruitment into careers of education. Huling (1998) pro-motes the importance of early field experiences as a means of teacher
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retention. In conjunction with this recommendation is another torecruit high school students into community college educationprograms, perhaps working through the Future Teachers of AmericaOrganization.
A final recommendation that comes out of this study is thatcommunity colleges should offer introductory education courses(Moore, 2000). Moore contends that students must have exposure toreal classroom situations early in their program of study. The datafrom the research in this paper reflect and validate Moore’sfindings.
CONCLUSION
Teacher preparation programs are no longer the exclusive propertyof four-year institutions. In view of the massive nationwide teachershortage, the community college is profiled as the institution that ishighly capable of educating the teachers of tomorrow (Manzo, 2003).Throughout our nation, community colleges are establishing newpolicies, creating new courses, and forming new partnerships withlocal school districts to recruit and train greater numbers of tea-chers. The urgent teacher shortage in many states has caused thosestates to look to the community colleges to help prepare largernumbers of multi-ethnic and multicultural teachers for our class-rooms. Although many two-year institutions have been activelyinvolved with teacher training for years, parents, politicians, andcitizens in general have not realized the potential that communitycolleges have for developing quality teacher preparation programsuntil now. Of the three million teachers needed in the next fiveyears, community colleges can provide up to 25% (Manzo, 2003).Modeled teacher preparation programs such as the ones in Arizona,California, Florida, and Texas work collaboratively with their K-12school districts to improve teacher quality, to increase the number ofstudents who choose teaching as their careers, and to providealternative certification programs. Many of these programs includepreservice or beginning teacher tutoring and=or mentoring as themain strategy of training in classroom environments. Thesepreservice and beginning teachers model their mentors while theydiscover themselves through constructive approaches in student-centered learning environments. Mentoring and modeling help thewould-be teachers develop favorable or unfavorable attitudes aboutteaching which can lessen or increase their anxieties about theirchosen profession.
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