EHE News
Partnership with Royal Shakespeare Co. to harness student energy
- Teacher Ed Program Kicks Off in UK - from the OSU/Royal Shakespeare Co. partnership blog
New EHE graduate certificate program advances teacher-leader skills
Rebecca Kantor
Twenty Ohio public school teachers are on their way to England this summer to begin a three-year teacher education program at the core of a new partnership between The Ohio State University and United Kingdom's Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC).
The partnership, the only one of its kind in the U.S., will promote literacy, drama education, and leadership in the public schools.
The teachers, from grades 3-12 and different subject matter areas, are the first cohort in the graduate certificate program that will enrich and extend their ability to engage students with Shakespeare.
They come from Franklin County's Metro Early College High School, Columbus City Schools' Linden McKinley High School and its feeder schools, and Reynoldsburg City Schools.
The schools are STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) schools affiliated with the Ohio STEM Learning Network (OSLN).
"We're excited to create this new program for teachers and curriculum leaders," says Rebecca Kantor, director of the School of Teaching and Learning, College of Education and Human Ecology. "The opportunity to partner with the Royal Shakespeare Company's acclaimed 'Stand Up for Shakespeare' program, with its experience in creating teacher-leader networks in England, is groundbreaking. This professional development opportunity will prepare teachers across disciplines to engage learners with innovative, high-impact approaches."
Native of UK leads the program
Brian Edmiston
Leading the certificate program for Ohio State is Brian Edmiston, associate professor of teaching and learning and an internationally recognized expert on inquiry-based approaches to drama education. When RSC learned that Edmiston, a native of the United Kingdom, would guide the coursework and evaluation of the program's impact, the company chose Ohio State over other U.S. universities.
"I'm eager to work with teachers, curriculum leaders and students in grades 3-12 on the complex, engaging themes of Shakespeare's plays," Edmiston says. "It will be exciting to discover together, over three years, how we can become a collaborative community of readers, thinkers, and creators."
Led by faculty from Ohio State and the RSC's education staff and actors, the program will help teachers bring the timeless literature of Shakespeare to life for students by integrating dramatic, inquiry-based units of study into STEM schools. The summer programs will be followed by coursework for the teachers throughout the school year. In 2012, a Young People's Shakespeare Festival is planned to coincide with the City of Columbus bicentennial.
Multidisciplinary approach to inspire STEM students
Educational leaders from the schools collaborated to identify the participating teachers from a broad range of disciplines. Says Marcy Raymond (MA '98), principal at the Metro Early College High School in Columbus, "This teacher education program is perfect for Metro, where we focus on critical thinking and strive to teach students to express what they think and how they think in multiple formats. Plus, it's a really good chance to advance the comprehensive view of STEM and how the program will involve more than just an English class. It will be a collaboration across all areas in the school."
As participating teachers become expert, they are expected to lead peer-to-peer professional development so the effects of the program cascade through the involved schools and districts. They will also present their projects to the Ohio STEM Learning Network in the spring of the second and third years.
Michael Boyd, artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, said at a meeting of the OSU Board of Trustees, "I know that this partnership will enrich the RSC's already highly successful education program. We look forward to sharing our deep commitment to inspiring and engaging students of all backgrounds and abilities in the work of our house playwright and learning from the innovative practices at The Ohio State University."
The partnership is spearheaded by the Arts Initiative at Ohio State, led by Associate Vice President Karen Bell, and includes several departments in the colleges of the Arts and Humanities, as well as the Wexner Center for the Arts. Students in the Department of Theatre will be actively engaged in working with Royal Shakespeare Company actors and public school teachers. The participation of the College of Education and Human Ecology is led by Associate Dean Sandra Stroot.
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