Year 1

We believe that all our teacher candidates should have deep knowledge of content and so much of the first year will involve coursework that provides an introduction to a range of disciplines. You will also have the opportunity to engage in initial fieldwork in a school.

Year 2

You will continue to deepen your knowledge in targeted content areas while developing your teaching skills through coursework on campus and expanded field experiences in the K-12 classroom.

Year 3

While content coursework continues, you will see a significant shift to a focus on teaching, including coursework and field experiences relevant to working in a school.

Year 4

Most of your final year consists of student teaching, methods classes, and some continuing content coursework. As a student teacher, you will work one-to-one with an experienced and high-quality teacher who, with support from UNC faculty, will hone your teaching skills. You will also study for and complete the relevant licensure examinations.

UNC ensures our coursework is delivered in direct connection to the reality of the field. Additionally, we ensure that our teacher candidates receive early, frequent, and focused field experiences that gradually allow them to develop their skills as a new teacher. Candidates will benefit from at least 1,000 hours of clinical field experiences. At our Center for Urban Education in Denver candidates receive about 3,000 hours of field experience. All field experiences allow teacher candidates to engage in small group and whole classroom instruction.

UNC is committed to the development of teachers who are prepared to work with all students in order to maximize P-12 students' potential. To achieve this, we require our candidates to take and pass courses that deal with diversity in both the Liberal Arts and Education components of the program. Candidates become competent in working with culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students and students with special needs; all programs require at least six credits of coursework focusing on CLD and three credits of coursework focusing on special education. Our field experiences incorporate strategies for working with diverse student populations and involve candidates in using strategies that benefit all students. Additionally, we encourage future UNC students to explore the Cumbres program. Cumbres is a scholarship and support program for students who are planning to become ESL teachers. Our goal is to support, encourage and prepare you to be an effective and compassionate teacher of English learners. You can learn more here.

UNC carefully selects all mentors and classroom teachers who work with our candidates. We also carefully select the schools in which we place our candidates. Our university faculty are rewarded for modeling high-quality teaching. During field experiences, each teacher candidate will work closely with a school mentor teacher and a faculty supervisor who model good teaching and provide constructive guidance that facilitates the professional growth of the candidates. While we hold our candidates to high expectations, all this work is completed in a supportive environment. We want our candidates to be successful.

Monitoring program and graduate quality is an important feature of UNC's programs. We collect and use performance data to inform program improvement. We survey various groups (students, graduates, and employers), analyze the performance of our candidates in their coursework and on licensure tests, review data on the teaching performance of our faculty, and incorporate feedback from external agencies into our data-informed decision making. Feedback from school districts is critical to ensuring our programs are current and relevant for the needs of our school partners. School personnel serve on our committees and are invited to campus regularly to share their needs and perceptions of our programs.