College of Education Research Lab Overview

Education in 2023 has changed. Today, teachers are dealing with issues due to the ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic and many other issues. Nearly 40% of students are not reading at grade level, and that has impacted their work in other content areas as well. Students are dealing with more mental health issues than ever before, and teachers are needed to help students get caught up academically and socially. University students in the College of Education are not only focusing their attention on subject area expertise and pedagogy, but they are also learning how to cope with the issues they will be facing in the classrooms, mostly due to circumstances that are completely out of their students’ control. The focus on this research lab is to see how to prepare pre-service teachers to know what the expectations will be for entering the teaching profession to allow them to be ready to deal with helping students overcome trauma and academic challenges they need to deal with to be successful in school and in life. One of the other elements of the research lab will be to learn how we can not only prepare students for entering the profession but also to see what support is available to retain these young teachers—many of whom leave the profession after only a few years.