Newsweek Honors UT Education Efforts

In the latest issue of Newsweek, "admission officials, educational consultants, students, parents and college and university leaders" were questioned to find the best American colleges in specific fields. The Top 25 Listing included topics such as Hottest Sports Fans (Florida), Hottest in the War on Terror (New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology) and Hottest for Loving the Outdoors (St. Mary's College of Maryland).

Individual achievements by various UT professors and the efforts of Teach for America on campus were recognized by Newsweek, as well as the 10-year old UTeach program, which offers teacher accreditation and is one of the only programs in the country to have early in-class experience at various local Austin middle and high schools.

The excerpt from the Newsweek article:

Hottest for Saving America's Schools University of Texas-Austin, Austin, Texas

Texas' flagship state university is rising to new prominence in education reform. UT-Austin researchers like economist Chrys Dougherty have done landmark work on the effects of Advanced Placement high-school courses on college success. UT mathematician Uri Treisman has led the way in raising the level of instruction for minority children. A rapidly expanding program called UTeach recruits science and math majors into teaching with classroom experience as early as freshman year. "The kind of mentoring I received from master teachers was really important," says Katie Weber, a 2004 UTeach alum who teaches seventh-grade science. The Teach for America program on campus is soaring, with the number of new graduates heading for inner-city and rural classroom assignments increasing from 24 to 62 in just on year.

Photo courtesy of Davis Ayer