Initial findings of the Physics Teacher Education Program Analysis rubric: What do thriving programs do?

Systematic research on physics teacher education (PTE) programs in the United States is rare, owing both to the great variety of practices and structures enacted by U.S. PTE programs and to the lack of measurement tools available to measure what successful PTE programs do. To help meet the need for a specific, objective, and reliable guide for research on PTE programs, the Physics Teacher Education Coalition developed the Physics Teacher Education Program Analysis (PTEPA) rubric, which characterizes the practices and structures observed at “thriving” PTE programs (defined as programs in the U.S. that frequently graduate five or more physics teachers per year). Initial research based on the PTEPA rubric suggests that thriving programs are strong in multiple areas (especially institutional commitment, leadership, and collaboration among partners in education and physics), and that several areas of strength align with those indicated by the existing PTE literature. However, thriving programs are not necessarily strong in all areas, instead reflecting local conditions at the institutional and state level. Such findings illustrate the opportunity for measurement and hypothesis testing about the most important features that PTE programs should have.

Figure 1

Percent of ratings at least benchmark level at each studied program for each standard. Percentages are calculated by adding the percent benchmark and percent exemplary. Those for which 76% or more of items are rated at least benchmark are shaded dark gray; those for which 50%–75% of items are rated at least benchmark are shaded light gray.

Figure 2

Percent of items rated at each level across all eight studied programs, by standard. From the left are shown not present (gray), developing (light shaded), benchmark (medium shaded), and exemplary (dark shaded). Percentages are out of the number of available ratings per standard (No. of items/standard $\times 8$ programs).

Figure 3

Percent of items rated at each level across all eight studied programs, by component. From the left are shown not present (gray), developing (light shaded), benchmark (medium shaded), and exemplary (dark shaded). Percentages are out of the number available ratings per component (No. of items/component $\times 8$ programs).

Figure 4

Percent of items rated at each level across all eight studied programs, on the entire rubric. Percentages are out of the number available ratings per standard (No. of items total $\times 8$ programs).

Figure 5

Percent of items in component 4B rated at benchmark level (light gray) or exemplary level (dark gray) at each of the studied programs (A–H). Percentages are out of the number of items in component 4B, which is five.

Figure 6

Percent of items in component 5C rated at benchmark level (light gray) or exemplary level (dark gray) at each of the studied programs (A–H). Percentages are out of the number of items in component 5C, which is four.