Teaching Profession

Group to Develop Model Ethics Standards for Educators

By Stephen Sawchuk — April 23, 2014 1 min read
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If you read Teacher Beat with any regularity, then you know that I often make the point that rules for teachers and other educators vary greatly by state. This extends to misconduct, a topic that’s certainly been in the news in recent months.

Now, a group wants to craft a model code of ethics for educators, to better inform states and the field about what best practices in this much-debated area look like.

The (take a deep breath for air) National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, or NASDTEC, announced Wednesday that it has tapped 20 educators from across the states to sit on a task force to develop the model code.

“Each state or jurisdiction has its own laws and rules, and thus as a nation, we are often challenged by the variances in both the process of discipline when an educator has misbehaved as well as the basic tenets upon which discipline may or may not be issued,” the initiative’s website states. “These disparities diminish the ability of the education profession to establish for itself the baseline behaviors that society can and should expect of professional educators, and indeed what a practitioner can and should expect of him or herself.”

Representatives will include teachers, superintendents, principals, and paraprofessionals.The group will have its first meeting in Baltimore in June and will release the standards within one year.

Find out more details about the project at NASDTEC’s website and list of task force members here.

Funding for the project comes from the for-profit University of Phoenix and nonprofit Educational Testing Service; NASDTEC and the National Network of State Teachers of the Year are providing staffing and in-kind support.

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A version of this news article first appeared in the Teacher Beat blog.