For the past five years Dr. Pancrazio has driven to Little Village schools on report-card pickup days. He’s brought along some 250 college students on his trips. All are advanced students of Spanish. Nearly all plan to become teachers themselves. Pancrazio talks to his college students about conveying cultural perspectives. He tells them Hispanic parents often spend lots of time expressing gratitude for teachers’ work. And he tells them they might end up translating conversations about immigration or health—since the school may be parents’ main connection to this society.

http://www.wbez.org/story/translating-parent-teacher-conference-94349

In the fall of 2011, the French, German, and Spanish teacher education programs earned national recognition from the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) and American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL).

All teacher education programs at Illinois State University seek accreditation from NCATE, which involves a “voluntary peer review process that involves a comprehensive evaluation” of programs that preparation of teachers and other professional school personnel. The review is based on the performance-based NCATE/ACTFL Program Standards, a set of research-based national standards developed by the world language teaching profession, and teacher candidate assessment tools in line with those standards. This assessment process included a review of seven key assessments, which include assessments from world language specific pedagogy courses, the Oral Proficiency Interview, the State of Illinois Content Test, and a student teaching assessment, among other tools.

Our annual undergraduate award ceremony was held on April 26.  Cake and refreshments were served.  Eight undergraduates were award recipients this year.

Check out the photo gallery.

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Congratulations to all of our award recipients!
Kelsey Coker was awarded the Robert G. Bone Scholarship.
Bridget Looby (not pictured) received the Allie Ward Billingsley Scholarship.
Laura Soppet and Kelsey Giger each received the Alma Latina award from the Spanish Club.
Bess Lanker was awarded the Petrossian-Tarrant Award for a summer study abroad in Grenoble, France.
Brianna Coleman (not pictured), Adam Gebler, Megan Braffet and Kyle Whisenhunt (not pictured) all received the German Alumni New Student Scholarship.
Kristofer Lindsey (not pictured) was the recipient of the David J. Parent Scholarship.