"Those who can, do. Those who UNDERSTAND, Teacher!" Associate Professor of Mathematics, Sue Parsons proudly said.  Unable to suppress her excitement, Parsons is speaking about the new program at Cerritos College to establish a teacher training center.  TRAC is designed to prepare future teachers in the field of education and is a partnership between Cerritos and California State University, Long Beach.

STARTING THE PROGRAM 

    Students who are interested in the program would start at Cerritos and upon completion of general education requirements with teacher preparation, admission into CSULB would be guaranteed.  The problem to be address by this project is the shortage of teachers being trained for kindergarten through 12th grade classrooms for California's public schools.

    According to the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, over two million new teachers will need to be hired over the next 10 years, due to rising school enrollments and rapidly increasing teacher retirements. Of all the 50 states California's teacher recruitment, developments and diversity challenges may be the most daunting.  Each year California's public school student population increases, prompting the need to hire an estimates 27,000 teachers per annum.

INCREASE TRANSFER NUMBERS

    Along with the many local community colleges, Cerritos is working to prepare increasing numbers of transfer students to the universities, many of whom will become credentialed teachers serving local districts.  Parsons, who is also TRAC project director said, "Teacher preparation is no longer a hidden mission at Cerritos. We want to make it known that it is honorable to be a teacher."

    Besides access to high-tech training and upper-division courses at Cerritos, students will also do field work (not just as aides) in local elementary schools.

CBEST PREPARATION

    While at Cerritos, students will also be able to take CBEST preparation classes, which upon completion, they can take the CBEST test.  CSULB chose Cerritos mainly because of the technological edge it offers over the other community colleges.  Cerritos also offers more foreign language classes, for which there is a requirement. Many of the classes are impacted at CSULB.

    Cerritos' largest transfer is CSULB, but most students transfer to CSU Dominquez for teacher prep.  Dr. Steven Helfgot, executive director of school/community relations, hopes to have the program, which has been in the making since September '98, fully implemented by the fall semester.  "One advantage to the union between Cerritos and CSULB will allow faculty from Long Beach to come here to teach classes." Helfgot pointed out. Many of these classes would be in technology.  Among those involved in establishing criteria for the program are Bob Chester, Faculty Senate president and Jan Dennis-Rounds, transfer center director.

LOCAL RECRUITMENT 

    Parsons and Helfgot said that recruitment for the program will start with the local high schools from neighboring districts.   They are working on establishing criteria for enrollment in the program, but planned to be ready for "Senior Day" held last Friday.  Parsons pointed out that teacher preparation has been a priority of the U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley. "He called attention to the fact the teaching is a 'patriotic thing to do."