Career Development Continuum for Urban Educators.

A continuum of professional development proposed at the University of North Florida conceptualizes points along the continuum as junctures for initiating collaborative activities between public schools and higher education. The findings of four different studies were merged to investigate the career development continuum of urban educators. The first study focused on stages of career development and examined the differences in career concerns of 44 experienced urban teachers and 87 preservice education students. Significant differences were found in the means on three scales of the Adult Career Concerns Inventory. A second study investigated the pattern of work values as measured by the Work Values Inventory of S. Super using the same groups. There were no significant differences in values between the groups. The third study addressed the career commitment of 143 experienced teachers, and the fourth study compared the career commitment of 87 students completing internships in urban schools to that of the preceding group of teachers. Preservice teachers were more likely to think that they would still major in education if they were beginning their educations, and they were less likely to plan to change careers. Data indicate that self-report data might not be the best way to identify the steps and stages in the professional development of urban teachers because of differences in the career concerns of experienced and preservice teachers. (Contains 2 tables, 2 figures, and 56 references.) (SLD) *********************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * *********************************************************************** Career Development Continuum for Urban Educators. Robert Drummond and Cheryl Fountain U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION OtIrce of Educatronal Research and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER IERICI 0 Thrs document has teen reproduced as recerved trorn the person or orgonuabon orrofnatrng Arlrnor changes have been made to rmprove eproductron quality Points of view or opinions stated rn this docu ment do not necessardy represent otficrai OERI positron or poIrcy BEST COPY AVAILABLE PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE ,1* JD DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY