CEIS Earns CTC Accreditation Renewal: Removes Stipulations

The teacher credential programs in the College of Education and Integrative Studies (CEIS) at Cal Poly Pomona attained their accreditation renewal by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC) in Spring of 2023 with stipulations. CTC sets the standard for educator preparation programs for California PK-12 schools. The commission gave CEIS one year to address these stipulations by Spring of 2024.

During this year there was transition in leadership within the college. Dean Hinda Gilli-Elewy and Interim Associate Dean Joanne Van Boxtel stepped down from their roles in Summer of 2023. Dean Jenelle S. Pitt-Parker and Interim Associate Dean Neil Chaturvedi stepped into these leadership roles in Summer of 2023. CEIS’ new leadership jumped into their new roles with a deadline to meet.

“Joining the College of Education and Integrative Studies in July 2023, knowing that we needed to respond to accreditation stipulations in the early Spring, meant that we only had Fall 2023 to marshal efforts. With this knowledge, I went to "work!" I had to convene the team quickly and facilitate contexts that would lead to the level of buy-in with team members in the College, across campus, and in the community to move the work forward.” Said Dean Pitt-Parker.

The Accreditation Committee got to work to address these stipulations, which included accreditation team lead, Education Professor, Dr. Amy Gimino, Dean Pitt-Parker, Associate Dean Chaturvedi, Deans of the Colleges of Science, Agriculture, and Letters Arts and Social Sciences, Chairs from pipeline departments, undergraduate advisors and support staff from credential and pipeline programs.

“The work of the committee has shifted to re-envisioning the future of credential programs at Cal Poly Pomona, identifying areas that would be most transformative and impactful as well as areas that pose barriers to moving forward. Our vision is to launch a “Future of Education'' Committee in 2024-2025 which will include cross-campus and community collaboration. To further support continuous improvement, we are envisioning and expanding upon our Accreditation Coordinator position to focus on assessing and enhancing unit processes including recruitment, admissions, advice and assistance, and program impact centering our values of diversity, equity and inclusion.” Said Dr. Gimino.

The accreditation team addressed the stipulations by implementing the following:

• Successful faculty searches resulting in four 2023-2024 hires and three 2024-2025 hires.
• A new Credential Analyst II position to support prospective and current students and AB 130 work.
• Job description changes and reclassifications for our Field Experience, Practicum Placement, and Early Childhood Studies Placement Coordinators.
• Increased assigned time to support targeted outreach and recruitment for bilingual and single subject areas.
• A dedicated workgroup to co-designing a Degree Progress and Credentials Reporting System to support students in monitoring progress throughout their program.

These implementation changes demonstrated that the teaching credential program has the infrastructure to operate effective educator preparation programs. It also determined that students are developing the knowledge and skills to support PK-12 students in meeting state content standards and students are supported in all areas of the educator preparation programs.

“I want to commend the work of the committee and thank Dean Pitt-Parker for her tremendous leadership in meeting and exceeding the CTC mandates,” Cal Poly Pomona President Soraya Coley said. “The entire College of Education and Integrative Studies, Dean Pitt-Parker and her team provide our students opportunities to achieve their dreams as educators, and elevate our community in ways that will the future for decades to come.”

In Spring 2024, the CTC Committee reviewed the actions taken to address the stipulations by the Accreditation Committee. After reviewing the evidence that the Accreditation Committee addressed the CTC Committee recommended the removal of all stipulations.

“Achieving "Accreditation" status was a huge win! It was a collective commitment of leadership, passion, and commitment to teacher education and educator preparation as well as what it takes to deliver high-quality programs. Moreover, the process allowed the team to critically examine infrastructure and services, in the spirit of continuous improvement, that we could fortify as we prepare future educators including those from racially, culturally, and linguistically diverse backgrounds to meet immediate workforce and community needs.” Said Dean Pitt-Parker.

There is still work to be done to strengthen this program. A year from now, Dr. Gimino hopes to see more implementations to the program. “Educator Preparation extends beyond CEIS and is a CSU and university-wide commitment, I believe a director position that oversees unit operations, stakeholder involvement, continuous improvement and appropriate resources would be most impactful.” Says Dr. Gimino. 

Stakeholder involvement is also important to this program. CEIS continues to grow relationships with district and community partners. Dr. Gimino quotes, “The Cal State University’s New Generation of Educators for California Initiative (NGEI) Brief (2018), The Power of Partnerships in Teacher Preparation, offers a roadmap for campus leadership and our Future of Education Committee to support productive district and community partnerships. Characteristics of success include shared vision and complementary goals, defined focus for collaboration, commitment of human and fiscal resources; accountability and clear responsibilities, active involvement of instructional leaders, alignment of instructors and administrators and structure that enables success, and a means to learn and improve (p.2).”

This work was a campus community effort. It could not have been done without the support of Provost S. Terri Gomez and President Soraya M. Coley “We are grateful for the President and Provost's commitment to teacher education and educator preparation as well as being supportive of the College's goal of growing our regional impact.” Says Dean Pitt-Parker.

For more information about CEIS and its teacher preparation programs, visit www.cpp.edu/ceis/education