3c. Multiple Stakeholders

The Education Department engages stakeholders and completers in multiple ways. Examples of some of these varied modes of engagement include the MAE Advisory Board, semester updates and solicitation for feedback sent by the Department Chair to current pre-MAE undergraduate and graduate students, the Completer Survey and Focus Groups, soliciting mentor teacher feedback on measures used in field experiences (e.g., Professional Dispositions, Social Justice, MEES), and other periodic content-area specific solicitation of completers for suggestions for improvement. While these modes of engagement provide valuable data that have led to improvement and innovation, some of the processes of engaging the stakeholders and completers are conducted on an ad hoc basis. The semester updates, MAE Advisory Board, disposition rubrics, and Completer Survey are the three modes of engaging stakeholders and/or completers that are regular and ongoing. 

Each semester, the Department Chair reports to all students who are enrolled in our MAE Blackboard course, which includes any student who has shown an interest in education (undergraduate and graduate). The bi-annual updates include information from all of the department meetings and working meetings. Students are encouraged to contact the Department Chair for more information, volunteer opportunities, and to provide suggestions. The updates from Fall 2019-Spring 2021 are available here.

Additionally, we have an Advisory Board that was developed in 2007 and our membership has evolved several times since then due to changes in personnel and participation from our stakeholders. Our Advisory Board meets twice a year (once each semester) virtually. Current members are:

  1. Christy Grissom, school counselor, principal  in Adair County R-I (Brashear) School District
  2. Brenda Matheney, MAE Graduate and teacher in Adair County R-II (Novinger) School District
  3. Paya Sample, MAE graduate and principal at Central Christian School, Clayton 
  4. Christopher Best, MAE graduate and principal in Kirksville R-III School District
  5. Jen Meyer, Special Education Director in Kirksville R-III School District
  6. Tricia Reger, assistant superintendent, Kirksville R-III School District
  7. Alex VanDelft, MAE graduate and principal in Knox County R-I School District
  8. Aaron Wills, MAE graduate and principal in Parkway School District
  9. Jessica Daniels, MAE Graduate and teacher in Schuyler County R-I School District
  10. Jeanne Harding, Director of the Institute for Academic Outreach, Field Experiences, and Graduate Studies
  11. Lance Ratcliff, Dean of School of Health Sciences and Education
  12. Wendy Miner, Department Chair of Education
  13. Julie Lochbaum, Professor of Education and coordinator of Advisory Board

Criteria for members:

  • Represent districts where we regularly place students
  • Represent a variety of roles within districts, and years in the profession
  • We have two people from several constituencies to try to ensure that one person can always attend or respond to minutes 

Since inception the committee has:

  1. Generated our departmental flow chart of student expectations for the three different levels of field placements. This was in response to feedback that mentors and administrators did not know what they should be expecting from a Truman student walking into their classrooms.
  2. Recommended dispensing with the former student evaluation of mentor teachers
  3. Met with accreditation site-visit teams during two accreditation rounds
  4. Served as a sounding board for developments in the MAE program,
  5. Provided suggestions for future directions of the MAE program
  6. Provided a member to faculty search committees
  7. Attended departmental forums with candidates for faculty positions
  8. Met once per semester until Spring 2020 when COVID-19 canceled our planned meeting. We have since converted to virtual meetings, retaining the once-per-semester schedule. 
  9. Have participated in the Truman State University Career Expos (This is true for both Kirksville and Parkway every single semester.  Is intermittently true for Knox, Novinger, Schuyler and Brashear).
  10. Have provided feedback on our goals of social justice and our social justice disposition rubric, and encouraged us to implement them
  11. Have seen the different technology available in our revised classroom VH1304
  12. Brainstormed solutions to the field placement shortage due to COVID-19
  13. Expressed interest in coordinating substitute teacher training to encourage Truman students to fill the gaps in personnel available in their districts.

Mentor Data
Mentors are key stakeholders in the MAE program. They provide data for the MAE program on multiple measures depending on the level of clinical experience for the teacher candidates. For example, at the internship level, mentors complete the MEES evaluation multiple times throughout the internship–sharing that data with the University Supervisor and intern. Mentors complete the social justice rubric/checklist and/or the professional disposition. That data is collected from all the mentors, recorded in spreadsheets, analyzed and disseminated as part of our retreats. We are in the process of refining data collection procedures.