Bethel University wins case against State Board of Education regarding teacher licenses
McKENZIE, Tenn. — Bethel University has won its petition against the Tennessee State Board of Education regarding the university’s ability to prepare college students to take the state’s teacher licensure test.
Bethel won its petition against the board with the final order of the Davidson County Court case being delivered in late June, according to a release from the university.
Bethel filed the petition against the state board after the board denied approval for Bethel to continue to license teachers.
The board made that decision by an 8-1 vote in July 2016. At that time, state officials said the school did not meet two of six national standards and would not accept their application for accreditation.
The two standards were candidate knowledge, skills and professional dispositions; and assessment system standards.
Bethel University President Walter Butler said the final order of the case was that Bethel’s status would be restored to the approved status it possessed before the board’s 2016 decision and that all costs involved with the case would be taxed to the Tennessee State Board of Education.
“To know that the court felt like the State Board’s revocation of our ability to license was invalid is gratifying,” Butler said in the release. “We know that we have a strong teacher education program. We have always received a lot of anecdotal feedback from school systems who praise the kinds of teachers we have educated. And we’ve had a 100 percent pass rate for our students taking the PRAXIS Principles of Learning and Teaching examination in three of the last five years with a 93 percent and 98 percent pass rate the other two years. This clearly shows that Bethel’s teacher candidates have been prepared to teach.”
“This is what we had been hoping for,” Butler said. “We are so excited to be back in the business of preparing teachers for the classroom. With the court’s final order of putting us back at the approved status we were at before, we can hit the ground running to enroll students interested in teacher education programs.”
