In May of this year a bill was approved by the Michigan State Senate to eliminate the requirement for future educators to pass a basic skills assessment before earning their teaching certification. There has been a lot of backlash about this bill and a lot of assumptions that the state is trying to bring uneducated educators into the teaching profession. That assumption, to be blunt, is a load of crap.
As an education student, I feel that we should not have to pass a basic skills assessment to become a teacher because we already have to meet minimum criteria on a basic skills assessment to get into college. To become a teacher we go through many classes to prove our worth as educators and we still have to take teaching certification exams to get our certification.
I can understand where some people are coming from with their assumptions that eliminating this assessment makes it easier to become a teacher, because it does. We have one less test to take but we still have to prove our worth and our competency during our college career. The extra assessment is actually creating more problems than solving them. At the institution I attend, you have to pass the basic skills assessment within your first two years of the certification pathway process or risk being kicked out of the program. Currently, I am at risk of being kicked out of the program because of this assessment that I am struggling to get passing scores for. To be fair, we have to get a 20 on the ACT to be accepted into the institution but with the switch to the SAT in the last year, the scores are harder to achieve.
If this bills becomes a law, more education students will have an easier pathway to teaching certification so that they can spend less time and money trying to pass a basic skills assessment. Knowing that there is a lot of backlash makes it harder for education students to want to continue on their pathway. We just want to become educators, without jumping through a bunch of hoops to do so.
Being an educator is a dream job for many and not having to jump through hoops to achieve that dream is amazing. Don't ruin our dream by making us pass a basic skills assessment we don't need to take.
