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The Indiana University School of Education Indianapolis is committed to examining our collective role in improving the human condition. We develop leaders, educators, and counselors equipped to critique and disrupt longstanding inequities and address the changing dynamics in urban educational contexts. Through community-engaged research, teaching and service, we seek to positively impact youth and adult learners in educational systems and serve the welfare of communities through engagement in strategic alliances to promote equitable, just, culturally relevant and sustaining practices in teaching and learning.
Focus on Urban Education
Our program's focus on the power and potential of educational experiences in urban environments and how education professionals can impact change. An urban education focus prepares education professionals for improving the schooling experiences of diverse learners in various contexts.
Professional Ethics Statement
You are preparing to become a teacher and to assume responsibility for the safety, well-being, development, and learning of all children. You agree to meet the professional expectations outlined below in all pertinent aspects of the Urban Teacher Education Program (UTEP) at IU Indianapolis.
The teacher education program at IU Indianapolis will prepare you to become reflective professionals possessing the skills, knowledge, and dispositions to contribute to promoting equity and social justice in an increasingly interactive and diverse society. IU Indianapolis' UTEP prepares you to become open-minded, responsible, wholehearted, and reflective practitioners who advocate on behalf of all students, particularly those deemed most vulnerable, owing to ability, ethnicity, gender identities, language, national origin, race, religion, or sexual orientation.
Each teacher candidate is responsible for following Indiana's ethical conduct for school professionals, as well as adhering to the IU Code of Student Rights, Responsibilities, and Conduct, and the IU Indianapolis Civility Statement (studentcode.iu.edu). In addition, during placement situations, local school officials may ask a student to leave the field or student teaching placement for any of the following reasons: immorality; misconduct in office; incompetence; or willful neglect of duty.
Professional Expectations
Engaging in Solving Dilemmas of Classroom Practice
Promote engagement for all students | Recognize, respect, and employ each student's strengths, diversity, and culture as assets for teaching and learning | Be sensitive to the external stressors students face | Maintain high expectations | Encourage independent, critical thinking | Strive for equity of educational opportunity and culturally responsive practices | Create a culture of inquiry and respect among learners
Awareness of and a Questioning Stance around One's Assumptions and Values
Develop informed teaching practices through continual study of theory | Supplement the curriculum with authentic resources and activities | Be flexible and responsive to individual learner needs | Facilitate mastery of skills and concepts | Implement multiple ways of teaching and learning
Attentive to Institutional and Cultural Contexts
Respect the ways in which growth and development in individuals may differ | Respect family and student goals, values, and unique identity | Promote open communication with the family | Act with cultural competence and responsiveness in interactions, decision making, and practice | Encourage democratic principles in both students and colleagues
Development and School Change
Work towards a learning environment that optimizes student academic, social-emotional, physical, and holistic well-being | Use multiple assessments
to identify student strengths and refine curriculum | Promote a safe and caring environment | Appreciate and manage group dynamics that contribute to the classroom
Responsibility for Professional Development and Lifelong Learning Commit to reflective practice and planning | Value and pursue opportunities for collaborative work with colleagues and families | Pursue personal and professional growth | Maximize teaching and learning experiences | Engage personal learning experiences that deepen and strengthen cultural literacy | Engagement in continuous improvement | Pursue a holistic and developmental vision for teaching and learning
I understand that as a student in the Urban Teacher Education Program, I may be withdrawn from the program and/or any field placement including student teaching, for failure to comply with these professional expectations. Other disciplinary actions may include, but are not limited to, an administrative alert, an unsatisfactory grade for the course or placement, dismissal from the school assignment or student teaching placement, removal from the Urban Teacher Education Program, and/or dismissal from Indiana University.
Culturally Responsive Practice
Eight Principles of Culturally Responsive Practice for Classrooms
Gloria Ladson-Billings created these in 1994 and they form a structure within which we view all of our teaching at Indiana University Indianapolis.
1. Communication of high expectations
2. Active teaching methods 3. Practitioner as facilitator
4. Inclusion of culturally and linguistically diverse students
5. Cultural sensitivity
6. Reshaping the curriculum or delivery of services 7. Student-controlled discourse
8. Small-group instruction
All of our coursework in the School of Education has revolved around these principles. Student teachers are well-acquainted with these principles and expected to enact them in their teaching.