The 1980 Session of the General Assembly agreed to House Joint Resolution No. 100, which recognized (i) that teachers make invaluable contributions to the well-being of society; (2) that their services, sometimes under difficult circumstances, deserve recognition and appreciation; (3) that because of the importance of teachers, the best possible persons should be attracted into the teaching profession and compensated adequately for their services; (4) that the adequate preparation of teachers by Virginia's colleges and universities is critical to the quality of teaching in elementary and secondary schools, and too many persons are being prepared to enter the teaching profession in several areas of endorsement; (5) that national reports have indicated that the standards for acceptance into undergraduate schools, colleges, and programs of teacher preparation are generally lower than standards for acceptance into other fields of study; and (6) that various suggestions have been proposed to improve the teacher training process, such as seminars for high school students who are prospective teachers, earlier exposure of students in teacher training programs to classroom experience, and a fifth-year Internship program.

The General Assembly therefore requested that state institutions of higher education with teacher training programs review their standards for acceptance of students into these programs in order to ensure that the standards equal or exceed those for other fields of study and report to the State Council of Higher Education, in a manner specified by the Council, the results of their reviews and comparative national test scores for students entering these teacher preparation programs and for those entering other fields of study. The legislature also asked that the State Board of Education and the State Council of Higher Education identify areas of certificate endorsement in which there are shortages of teachers. The General Assembly further requested that the State Council of Higher Education notify independent institutions of higher education with teacher training programs in Virginia of the concerns of. the General Assembly and request their participation in the study. The Council of Higher Education was requested to submit reports to the House Education Committee and the Senate Education and Health Committee, as well as a final report to the Governor and the General Assembly, no later than December 1, 1981.

In developing a plan for studying teacher preparation programs in Virginia, pursuant to House Joint Resolution No. 100, the Council staff consulted with the presidents of the public and private colleges, with the academic deans and vice presidents of the public colleges, and with the deans and institutional research officers of some of the private colleges. The Council of Higher Education reviewed the study plan at its June, 1980, meeting.

The goals of the study were twofold: first, to review the standards for acceptance into teacher preparation programs at Virginia's colleges and universities and to compare the standards with those in other fields of study and, second, to identify areas of certificate endorsement in which there are shortages of teachers. In conducting the study, the Council staff sought the participation of Virginia's state-supported and independent institutions of higher education, as specified in House Joint Resolution No. 100, and cooperated with the staff of the State Department of Education in identifying areas of teacher shortages.

The portion of the study conducted in 1980 was concerned with developing the study plan, assembling a bibliography of national and regional material on the subject, and collecting and analyzing national test scores of graduates of teacher preparation programs and of other fields of study. The focus in the early part of the study, therefore, was on those students at colleges and universities in Virginia who actually sought and gained certification to teach in one or more endorsement areas. An "Interim Report" of the findings in this phase of the study was published December 3, 1980, and was submitted to the House Education Committee and the Senate Education and Health Committee. The findings are incorporated into Chapter 2 of this final report.

Chapter 2 also includes the results of the Council staff's study during 1981 of the standards for acceptance of students into teacher preparation programs and of the standards for acceptance of students as majors in undergraduate degree programs. Chapter 3 presents the findings of the State Department of Education in its efforts to identify areas of certificate endorsement in which there are shortages of teachers. Finally, Chapter 4 offers some conclusions and recommendations based upon the present study.