Mission Statement

The School of Education at SUNY Cortland is committed to preparing our students to be creative and adaptive educators who are knowledgeable about their students and their social contexts, value all members of diverse educational communities, and utilize best practices of teaching and learning based in research and theory.

Our School of Education helps teacher candidates reach these goals by adhering to the following principles:

• Ongoing participation in interdepartmental discourse and collaboration to ensure a unified teacher education curriculum that respects and draws on the expertise of all faculty members.
• Development of faculty who are committed to college teaching, and stay current with new professional knowledge and developments in schools in order to enhance their teaching.
• Active and ongoing commitment to professional development through research, work in schools and with community based programs, including the creation of professional development school networks.
• Adherence to equity and social justice in their support of teacher candidates, and in their expectations of how teacher candidates will work with their own students, families, and communities.
• Involvement in education policy and practice through the generation of original research that adds to the knowledge base in education, and through advocacy and participation in professional organizations and in the political process.

Our teacher candidates will achieve these goals by striving to:

• Become reflective practitioners, whose teaching methods will be data-­informed, socially conscious, and theoretically grounded.
• Attain skills to meet the needs of all learners in diverse and inclusive environments.
• Maximize the development of the whole person through learner- centered, developmentally appropriate pedagogies.
• Become teacher leaders, who take an active role in schools, and advocate for issues of equity and social justice as they pertain to children, their profession, and schools, families and communities.
• Have the skills to be problem-­ solvers and creative, critical thinkers, who are life-­ long learners and value a liberal education.