Texas Tech University was one of the earliest US PREP programs to recast its field supervisors as site coordinators. The university’s college of education used to have part-time supervisors who were not Texas Tech faculty and who only observed student teachers a few times each year. Today, its site coordinators are full-time faculty members who work on-site at their assigned district, teach one university-based course but also host training sessions and coaching meetings for mentor teachers, and supervise 17-20 residents, typically spread across 3-5 school sites within a district or geographic region. Similarly, University of Houston has created site coordinator positions that include teaching responsibilities, but the position largely remains part-time and adjunct, with only a few in full-time faculty roles. Site coordinators supervise fewer residents than prior to program transformation but take on more responsibilities for resident coaching and support.

A third program, at Southeastern Louisiana University, took a different approach, reallocating 14 of its faculty members as site coordinators. Their primary responsibilities include course instruction, coaching teacher residents during walkthrough and performance assessment cycles, and training and coaching mentor teachers, who in turn provide daily feedback to the residents. 

Across the programs, the enhanced expectations for site coordinators have changed the way that programs interview and select for this role, shifting from an informal process to a more structured interview that covers coaching and curriculum as well as supervision, and often includes real-life scenarios. For example, Southeastern Louisiana noticed that use of data, knowledge of K-12 standards-based curriculum and providing resident feedback were areas of growth for many site coordinators around high quality, standards-based curriculum, so it has added interview questions and a simulated coaching session to address those needs. University of Houston started hiring site coordinators initially from among the ranks of existing field supervisors. “We went with the strongest field supervisors and interested faculty first,” said Shea Culpepper, Director of Teacher Education, noting that some self-selected out due to the increased demands of the position. “Our ultimate goal was to get more faculty members in the field, but in the end, they didn’t need to be full-time faculty to reach that goal.” Still, all site coordinators are required to have a masters in education and a minimum of three years of teaching experience in K-12 schools.

Site coordinators play a major role in ensuring that teacher residents will become high-quality classroom teachers from day one. As such, their interaction with residents has shifted from the intermittent interactions that field supervisors tended to have with student teachers to a more regular commitment that includes structured coaching and observation. For example, all three programs use “POP Cycles” (pre-conference, lesson observation, post-conference) to structure site coordinators’ observation of student teaching throughout the year so that both site coordinator and resident understand the expectations for supporting quality teaching.

To ensure that site coordinators are prepared to support residents as they strengthen their instructional practice, site coordinators at these programs tend to receive upfront and ongoing training. For example, at Texas Tech and University of Houston, site coordinators receive initial training on the instructional rubric they use to evaluate residents’ instructional competencies. They also work together to calibrate their findings across residents, observing the same video and script and scoring it so that they can see where their ratings are aligned. Texas Tech and University of Houston then conduct additional professional development for site coordinators based on the results of that calibration exercise to ensure that all site coordinators are aligned regarding resident expectations. Each year, site coordinators calibrate scoring and renew their certifications.

Over time, both Texas Tech and University of Houston have added an additional role – the Professional Development Facilitator – that helps to support and develop site coordinators,  assembling data for meetings, hosting monthly site coordinator meetings, and providing on-the-ground support with site coordinators as they support residents in the field. At University of Houston, the Professional Development Facilitator role is filled by Jahnette Wilson, a former site coordinator who helped pioneer the site coordinator role on the ground in Houston, and is now helping ensure the university’s dozens of site coordinators are working closely together. At Texas Tech, this role is filled by Sherre Heider, also a former site coordinator, and includes teaching one course and overseeing 8-10 site coordinators, helping them to facilitate mentor training sessions and governance meetings in addition to the above duties.

Prior to transformation, most of these teacher preparation programs did not need to have a governance function because there was only a loose relationship between the university and the schools and districts where student teachers were placed. However, program transformation includes a strong partnership between the university and school districts, who collaborate to identify needs, structure placements, and ensure that residents have the support of qualified mentor teachers ensuring their experience prepares them to be effective classroom leaders upon graduation. As such, site coordinators often plan and lead regular meetings with district and school leaders, and take more of a hands-on role in recruiting, training, and supporting mentor teachers to effectively coach residents.

At University of Houston and at Texas Tech University, site coordinators are responsible for the governance of the partnership with their assigned district(s) and coordinate communication between the program and the districts and schools with which it partners. While some of this governance happens in regular formal governance meetings with superintendents and assistant superintendents, much of it happens in informal communications that take place throughout the year as site coordinators work closely with principals on mentor teacher selection, and in their frequent communications with mentor teachers about residents’ experiences and progress (who in turn communicate with principals).

At Southeastern, however, the Dean’s office owns responsibility for governance of the district partnerships. “When our site coordinators had to take on more students, we took the governance structure and put it under the Office of Clinical Practice and Residency,” says Paula Calderon, Dean of the College of Education at Southeastern. “With the year-long residency and our partnership with US PREP, governance meetings became a part of the residency experience, conducted quarterly by the site coordinators.” Prior to that, district meetings were held informally and only on an as-needed basis. Conducting governance meetings regularly ensures a more cohesive and partner-driven experience for all stakeholders.

Scaling the number of site coordinators and paying them more than the salary for field placement office staff can increase costs – but most programs have found ways to keep the budget impact neutral.

At University of Houston, some of those costs have been covered by hiring retired faculty and paying them hourly with no benefits for several of the site coordinator positions. The university has also instituted a student teaching fee that helps offset some costs.

Meanwhile, at Texas Tech, funding for site coordinators was reallocated from positions that were no longer needed due to the expanded role of the site coordinator.  This included nearly $100,000 freed from salaries once allocated for a coordinator of pre-clinical experiences, a second staff position solely for arranging field placements for candidates, and piecework payments to university supervisors based on the number of students supervised. Now, Texas Tech provides site coordinators with a $10,000 stipend on top of their base pay ($45,000 for sites close to the university, and $50,000-$70,000 for distance sites served through the university’s Tech Teach Across Texas) to account for the added responsibilities they take on beyond teaching. All in all, these shifts have actually brought the administrative cost per resident down slightly and dramatically increased the quality of candidate clinical preparation.