Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education

 

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

Fall 2011

Citation

Lohfink, G, Morales, A., Shroyer, G., Yahnke, S. (2011). Building a distance-delivered teacher education program for rural CLD teacher candidates and the lessons learned. The Rural Educator, 33(1), 25-36.

Abstract

This article describes a collaborative, distance-delivered, teacher preparation program for rural, culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) teacher candidates. Multiple institutions partnered with one university in order to diversify the teaching force in the region and meet the needs of CLD students living there. In describing the program's design and implementation phases, a focus on cultural responsiveness to the candidates ' needs, their rural settings, and high populations of Latino/a students in the rural areas in which they were trained is presented. Assessment of each implementation phase guided program practice for the participants ' training as effective teachers. Relevant discussion indicates that even with responses to the pre-service teachers ' academic, social, and financial needs, issues of communication and barriers imposed by distances emerged. Additionally, while collaborative bonds among the partner institutions facilitated the candidates ' training as effective teachers, the building of multi-institutional partnerships concurrently with the implementation phases caused participants and implementers stress.

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