Birds Give Back, Illinois State University’s day of giving, is Thursday, February 22. This year, the School of Teaching and Learning is focusing on raising gifts to help cover the cost of content exams for future teachers.
The Illinois Licensure Testing Systems (ILTS) exam is a comprehensive exam that assesses a student’s understanding of the content that the state standards require them to teach. After a pause in the requirement, the state once again requires all teacher education students to pass their content test prior to student teaching. Each test costs $122, and many students must take more than one test depending upon their individual licensure goals. Last year, students spent $46,970 on their content test fees. Students who may not be able to afford this price risk delaying student teaching and graduation.
“Our goals are for them to be able to take it and pass the first time and for students to not have this additional cost for a state-level requirement when there are so many shortage areas in education right now,” says Allison Antink-Meyer, associate director of undergraduate programs in the School of Teaching and Learning. “There are so many hoops that future teachers have to get through in order to get into the classroom, and this one has a cost that is really high financially. So, I think my biggest concern is the financial burden it places on students who are going to be incredible teachers.”
Since the return of the state requirement, the Efaw Center for Educator Excellence and departments within the College of Education have come together to implement strategies that help students reach the milestone of passing their exam so they can complete their student teaching.
“Our students in general do pretty well. But because it wasn’t a requirement for so long, it meant that they weren’t hearing from their friends who were older than them about the test,” says Antink-Meyer. “We had more students than typical who had to take it multiple times, and that is just hundreds of dollars that really add up.”
Join us as we support future teachers. Gifts to the School of Teaching and Learning will help offset the cost of content tests, thus keeping excellent teachers on track to licensure and continuing the Illinois State University legacy of “gladly we learn and teach.”
