Information on Past trips

Educational Administration and Foundations

Fall 2004

Spring 2004

Photograph Montage (click pictures to enlarge)

Social Foundations:  Chicago Exploration Program

Teacher Education students enrolled in Social Foundations of Education may opt to participate in an urban education program in Chicago.  Students will participate in an intensive, four-day program visiting Chicago Public Schools, after school programs, neighborhoods, community organizations, ethnic restaurants and cultural venues. This experiential learning experience provides students with an opportunity to explore what it would be like to student teach and/or teach in a high-needs school district like Chicago. Through this experience, students begin to embrace the idea of living and teaching in an urban setting.

There are two main goals for this educational experience:

• To enhance students’ understandings of cultures, identities and contexts different from their own and of their own identities--both as individuals and as prospective teachers. It is hoped that this first-hand experience will create reflective students who embrace the idea of teaching a diverse student population.
• To enable participants to imagine themselves—in life-affirming, realistic, and reflective ways—living and teaching in diverse and low-income schools in Chicago or elsewhere.

The course objectives addressed through this urban experience are to increase the number of Illinois State University graduates who choose to student-teach and teach in under-served and high-need communities.