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Post-Master's Certification Program: Teacher of Students with Disabilities (SEDH)
Program Coordinator: Shridevi Rao, raos@tcnj.edu
Forcina Hall 308, 609/771-2308
Important LinksPost Master's Special Education Certificate Program (SEDH)
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Prospective Students
Description and Prerequisites
Current Students
Internships
Applying for Student Teaching
Graduating from the Post-Master's Certificate Program
DESCRIPTION AND PREREQUISITES
This 24-credit approved program is for students with a Master’s degree in Education and a prior teaching certificate who desire certification as a Teacher of Students with Disabilities.
Students applying for this program are required to have a Master’s degree in education and a CEAS or standard in elementary, secondary or content area. Students are required to have a prior course in Child Psychology and Reading. GRE scores are NOT required for this program.
INTERNSHIPS
1. Internship II requirements for the post-Master's certification program
All students enrolled in the M.Ed program have to complete Internship II-Student teaching experience. Students cannot be exempted from Internship II. Internship II for this program is mandated by the guidelines of our accreditation agency. Students are required to have completed all other coursework before enrolling in Internship II. In some cases, students might be allowed to take one additional course along with student teaching.
If you are planning to do student teaching “on the job”, you need to first discuss your plans to do so with the administration of the school district. Student teaching is an experience that involves designing and executing lessons for a variety of subject areas. It also requires that you eventually take over the instruction and planning for the class. If you are currently working as a ‘teaching assistant’, this may conflict with the responsibilities of student teaching. You need to discuss your situation with the district to make sure they will support you with this experience. Some students have resolved this by taking a leave of absence.
Student teaching can be completed “on the job” as long as you have at least 4 students with disabilities in your classroom. Additionally, your district should be willing to provide a mentor to conduct observations of your teaching and provide input to the college supervisor.
In addition to the above requirement, please refer to the STEP Guidelines and Policies for Student Teaching for additional details.
Student teaching is comprised of several key assignments. Apart from lesson planning and lesson execution, candidates are required to design and implement a Teacher Work Sample project. This is an intense project that includes the design and implementation of a unit.
Evaluation of student performance in the internship experiences is based on the required assignments as well as the performance in the field based components of the experience. Student performance in the field will be evaluated through the use of the teaching performance assessment checklist, the teaching dispositions checklist, lesson observation rubric and the departmental checklist.
APPLYING FOR STUDENT TEACHING
In order to apply for student teaching, students are required to fill out the STEP application and provide other supporting documents. Please refer to the STEP application process for details.
GRADUATING FROM THE POST-MASTER'S CERTIFICATION PROGRAM
Completing all the requirements of the program
You need to check with your advisor that you have completed all the requirements for your program. You are not ready to graduate if you have even one course or even a one credit independent study left to complete.
Applying for graduation
You have to fill out an Application for Completion of TCNJ Graduate Certification Program and submit it to the Office of Records and Registration.
Prerequisites
If you had prerequisite courses that you were asked to complete as a part of this program, submit the transcripts related to those courses to Shri Rao at the beginning of the semester when you are graduating.
Comprehensive exams
All master’s candidates entering the program from Fall 2008 onwards will be required to register for the comprehensive exams.
Certification
Additional information on certification can be found in the TCNJ School of Education Certification website.
