Differences in Experiences and Outcomes of Transfer and Native Students in an Elementary Education Program: an Exploratory Study Page: 42

                                
on national recognition for each of its program as required by the National Council for
Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE). Originally the EC-4 and 4-8 program
reviews were submitted to the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI)
only to find out from NCATE that ACEI had declined to review the programs. It was
recommended that the 4-8 program be reviewed by Association for Middle Level
Education (AMLE, formerly National Middle School Association, NMSA), but the UNT
program was a generalist program and did not follow the AMLE structure. Because of
this, the 4-8 program was excused by NCATE from a national review for the round. The
EC-4 program was submitted to National Association for the Education of Young
Children (NAEYC) for review in April 2002, and the program was nationally recognized
(Keller et al., 2002).
In 2002, the NCATE Examiner's report stated "Though some programs are
currently in review, with decisions pending, by the national specialty organizations, the
Texas State Board for Educator Certification has approved all College of Education
programs" (Prinzing et al., p. 4). The 2002 NCATE Examiner's report contained a few
areas for improvement and noted other areas that were corrected since the previous
visit. The first area of improvement was that the assessment plan for students was not
connected to the conceptual framework. Similarly, another area of improvement was
that performance in the field experience was not linked to the conceptual framework.
"In the 1997 NCATE Accreditation Action Report, the unit was cited for the following
weakness: The unit does not have an explicit plan with adequate resources to ensure
the recruitment and retention of a culturally diverse faculty" (Prinzing et al., 2002, p. 33).
In 1998, the College of Education established a diversity committee. The committee

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