I forgot to mention middle school and elementary school.
The new Ohio teaching licenses separate teachers into three age levels:
Early Childhood (K-3), Middle Childhood (4-8), and Young Adult (9-12).
In my recent posting I was talking only about Young Adult (i.e. high
school).
For middle school (4-8) Ohio requires teachers to declare two
specialties. They choose these from math, science, social studies,
English/language arts. This might be a good move if we can get any
middle-school teachers to choose science as a specialty. Our science
specialty at Bluffton College requires at least 8 semester hours in
physics, 8 in biology, 4 in chemistry, plus an earth science course and
an astronomy course. These all must be the same level of courses as
taken by science majors.
The elementary teachers (K-3) do not need any science beyond the
college general-education requirement in science. I am pleased that our
science gen-ed at BC is good. It is a year-long, lab-based, integrated
course which combines physics, earth science, astronomy, chemistry, and
biology. And, this is taught within the science department mostly by
Ph.D. scientists. So all our el-ed teachers will have had this
year-long course. We are not very typical in this regard.
The fear is that teachers will mostly flock into K-3, some into
high-school, and few into middle school. Since the middle school
science and math areas are difficult, those who do go into middle
school teaching will probably choose English and social studies. We
predict a very high demand for middle school science teachers.
Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D. Phone/voice-mail: 419-358-3270
Professor of Chemistry & Physics FAX: 419-358-3323
Chairman, Science Department E-Mail edmiston@bluffton.edu
Bluffton College
280 West College Avenue
Bluffton, OH 45817