My daughter is currently at a flagship University in the college of education. She’s interested in transferring because the college is much smaller and less engaging than she thought it would be. I’m trying to take what I know about her current experience to help her find what she’s looking for.
I’d like to find out how many students are in the college of education at each of the schools she’s interested in. I am not seeing that on the school websites. I can’t find it in the IPEDS dataset. Can anyone help me find this info?
Have you checked the programs/majors section? For example, IPEDS shows 333 education majors graduated from Miami in a recent year: College Navigator - Miami University-Oxford. While this information may not exactly match that for a college of education, it should nonetheless at least roughly correspond.
The programs / majors section in a school’s College Navigator entry should tell you how many students graduated from each major in a recent year. For example:
@TLZT - A few things you can do. The common data set lists percent of graduates by major. But for education majors you can search up the data for teachers certification by college. That will give you not only the number taking the test each year but the passing rate by school. My DD just finished her Masters in Special Ed, but I still have the spreadsheet I put together for her college search that covers (NY, NJ, PA, MD, CT) if you drop me a PM with your email address, I’m happy to send it over to you
I’m working on calls and/or email. I would imagine some people are taking a little time off after graduation and school is out, so I haven’t heard back yet.
Thanks for showing me that. I’ll have to back it up with info directly from the schools because I think it doesn’t capture and categorize data properly. According to this, UVM didn’t have any Secondary Ed graduates, which I know isn’t accurate. This is a great start though!
It doesn’t. Miami U does not have a college of education but rather a college of education, health, and society. Looking only at education majors is missing much of the picture, an example of why it is much better to get data directly from the colleges themselves.
The Office of Institutional Research at Miami U reports around 2500
full time undergraduates in the college of education, health, and society, a number which has slowly but steadily decreased each year since 2019 (2725).
Probably because preparation for high school teaching is subject specific, so you see programs like “English/Language Arts Teacher Education” and “Mathematics Teacher Education” (examples at University of Vermont). In some states, the expectation is to major in the subject (e.g. English, math, history, …) while also taking teacher preparation course work.
It would seem to me that a program that produces a large volume of PhDs could be said to be both larger (one of your criteria) and more engaging (another of your criteria). Size, however, is relative. This website breaks the data down into essentially 2 lists: gross (raw) number of PhDs and per capita PhDs. Again, these lists are the schools from which the PhD earned their bachelor’s degree.
In the education example, the University of Florida graduated the largest number of bachelor students who went on to earn a PhD in education with 175 students. Hampshire College, on the other hand, was first in the per capita category with only 9 students who graduated there with a bachelor’s and then went on to earn a PhD.
I honestly don’t think the size of the program is as important as what it does. Does the program prepare the students to gain certification in the state in which it is located, and pass the necessary praxis test. Does the program have a strong plan for integrating future teachers into schools before student teaching…student observations or something? How are job placements? For some kids, an integrated masters program is worthwhile because then they start their teaching careers on the masters salary schedule.
My undergrad program in speech language pathology was about 35-40 students per grade. That’s not very large. But it was a very highly regarded program with more than several nationally recognized and excellent faculty members. Lots of practicum opportunities. That mattered. Excellent advising.
My masters program was about the same.
Look at the quality of the program, not the number of grads.
I don’t think the size of the school or department dictates how engaging it is. One of my kids had a major within the school of education and the department was small. Despite the size, she had a great student teaching and clinical experience and was well prepared for grad school. She had a cohort of 8 in grad school…and a wonderful experience.
The number of graduates does not determine the quality of the program, imo.
Understood but the size of the program does matter. For instance, UVM has 108 students who graduated w/ an education degree in 2023. 40 elementary, 25 secondary (all academic single subject majors added together), 14 early childhood, 11 art, 4 middle level education (which is a very rare program). My daughter is currently in middle level but wants to change to secondary. Having a cohort of 4 is significantly different than 25. Many schools appear to lump their numbers into General since they have multiple education majors, but only General Education is listed in College Navigator, so it’s a little hard to tell.
It is true that many schools do clump education and some sort of social science or profession, however in College Navigator College Navigator - National Center for Education Statistics there is a breakout for Education, so that’s what I’ve been going by.
While a cohort of 4 for middle school education is small, it doesn’t mean that it’s a weak program. Are graduates getting jobs teaching middle school? How are the student teaching experiences?
Do the different cohorts take some of the same classes?
Perhaps it’s not the size that matters but OP is looking for a specific experience, academically or socially, that comes from a desired amount of heft ?
It’s a good program. One of the reasons she wants to transfer is that she would like to have the option to teach in California, which has some of the strictest requirements for credentialing. CA recognizes a 2 subject concentration for elementary and a single subject for secondary. It does not recognize Middle level at all. She didn’t realize ML was so limiting. She would like to change over to Secondary to allow her the full option of teaching 7-12 vs Middle which is only 6-8 or 7-9. If she wants the option of teaching in CA, it might make more sense to go to college in CA.