Student Teaching
Student teaching is a requirement for all of our initial licensure educator preparation programs. Student teaching must be completed within a 50 mile radius of the main campus in Lawrence, Kansas.
Guidelines
- Students must have a cumulative GPA of at least 2.75; a 2.5 GPA in the major; and cannot have earned a grade lower than a "C-" in any professional education course.
- Mandatory review of the Hawk Tracks....Guiding Your Journey Through Advanced Teaching Practicum and Student Teaching PowerPoint the spring semester before the academic year they are expected to student teach.
- Forms must be completed and sent to the Field Experience Coordinator on or before the due date provided in the PowerPoint presentation.
- All arrangements for advanced teaching practicum and student teaching are coordinated through the Field Experience office. Conversations are not permitted with school or district personnel regarding your placement. Once your placement has been confirmed by the school district, an email with be sent with all pertinent details.
- KU's priority is for students to experience diverse settings (demographics, schools, and districts) and therefore, placement will be in different locations. A variety of experiences with quality Clinical Supervisors prepares you for your career and future success. Students will indicate grade level and school district preferences on the student teaching form.
- As a reminder, The University of Kansas is committed to your future success as an educator. While the School of Education and Human Sciences considers your preferences, please be cognizant that each district determines its capacity to support student teachers and assigns clinical supervisors. Given that school districts collaborate with multiple colleges and universities, students may not always receive their preferred placement(s). Preferences are taken into account, but we ask that you remain open-minded and flexible once your placement is confirmed.
- If you are a KU teacher education candidate who is on track to student teach during the upcoming academic year, please visit Guiding Your Journey Through Advanced Teaching Practicum and Student Teaching to complete the required forms.
STAR Summative Evaluation
Assessment is an essential component of our students’ culminating field experiences. Use of assessment tools aligned with Kansas education standards and InTASC standards help our students better understand expectations and set goals for their performance. At the end of these culminating field experiences, the clinical supervisor and university supervisor should submit a STAR Evaluation Form online for the student(s) they supervise. When scoring, supervisors should consider the student’s performance over the entire experience.
STAR Instrument Training
Our accrediting body requires that our clinical and university supervisors be trained on our assessment tool. Therefore, prior to completing the STAR evaluation, please view the training module below. After viewing the module, please watch the teaching video and rate it using the STAR instrument.
Training Module
Classroom Observation
STAR Log-In & Submission Instructions
One-to-two weeks before the end of the field experience, you’ll receive a username, password and unique four-digit passcode via email. You’ll need this information to access the online STAR evaluation. If you haven’t received your log-in credentials by the last week of your student’s experience, please contact Jill McKay. After completing the evaluation training and locating your log-in credentials, you can complete the online STAR evaluation. The system will initially prompt you for your username and password. Next, enter your 4-digit passcode and last name to begin the assessment. Please note that you can come back to the form at a later time and your previous scores and comments will be saved. You don’t need to complete the evaluation in one sitting.
Unified early childhood has a program-specific STAR evaluation:
- STAR Evaluation for Unified Early Childhood/Early Childhood Unified
- UEC/ECU STAR Rubric (pdf)
- How-To Instructions for UEC/ECU STAR Form (pdf)