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Producing tomorrow’s teachers
A&M System’s commitment to Texas public schools

Howard D. Graves

Chancellor, Texas A&M University System

The statistics are daunting:

—The explosive population growth in Texas added 2.8 million new residents to the state from 1990 to 1998. That rate of growth is not predicted to slow down in the near future.

—The nation’s schools will need 2.2 million new teachers over the next decade to handle increases in enrollment and to replace those who are nearing retirement.

—Approximately half of new teachers in Texas leave the field within five years.

—And only 5 percent of the more than 68,000 Texas high school graduates who took the American College Test (ACT) this year indicated that they were interested in careers in education.

The Texas A&M University System is alarmed by these statistics and is taking measures to help secure the future of the state.

First, we are striving to change the traditional notion that higher education is separate from public education. We in higher education cannot afford to be concerned only with life after high school. Education in Texas must be a seamless process from kindergarten through college. This will require close collaboration among universities, community colleges and public schools.

Second, we must produce more teachers.

In 1996, the A&M System and the Texas Education Agency formed the Partnership for Texas Public Schools. Since its formation, the partnership has supported collaboration among A&M System universities and public schools through workshops, research efforts and other initiatives directed toward preparing tomorrow’s teachers.

The A&M System is now taking the partnership a giant step forward with the Regents’ Initiative for Excellence in Education, which reinforces critical ties among public schools, community colleges and the A&M System. This effort delineates a leadership path to improve significantly the quality and productivity of our educator preparation programs.

In this initiative, the presidents of the A&M System’s nine universities have pledged to increase the annual production of teachers by 33 percent by 2005. A&M System universities currently graduate about 2,500 teachers each year—approximately one in five of our Texas-educated teachers. Under this plan, that number will increase to more than 3,300 teachers—one in four of Texas-educated teachers. Of particular emphasis is an increase in the number of teachers in the fields of math, science, technology, foreign languages and bilingual and special education, as well as in the number of African-American and Hispanic teachers.

As we increase quantity, we will also focus on quality. Providing an increase in choice teachers for our state will not be a rapid process, but it is a critical one. It is also a process that can involve all of us.

The A&M System is already working with public schools, community colleges, government organizations, businesses and communities to guarantee that our children in Texas will be taught by top-notch new teachers, and that the students will be encouraged to become educators themselves.

Please join us as we strive to provide a positive tomorrow for our children through graduating teachers who will encourage them to pursue an education, to chase their dreams and to succeed. The future is in our hands.

Students always had knack for good, cheap fun

Dr. James Conrad

Archivist, Texas A&M University-Commerce

Going to school in the depths of the Great Depression challenged the ingenuity and determination as well as the pocketbooks of the students at A&M-Commerce.

Nevertheless, students found occasion to enjoy themselves and to let off steam even though they had little money. Inexpensive activities such as roller skating, picnics, movies, dances, football games, and walking along the railroad tracks were their escape. Margaret Ortize, retired Clarksville school teacher who attended the college in the early 1930s, had fun one snowy winter day when a friend hitched a horse up to a wooden painter’s ladder and pulled Margaret and her girlfriends around town through the deep snow.

Dating was popular, but the rules were very strict. In the later 1920s and early 1930s, co-eds were not allowed to ride in cars with men at night, called “night riding.” If a college man had a car, which was rather rare, he would park his car in front of his girlfriend’s dorm or boarding house, and the couple would walk to town to see the movie.

The Commerce movie theaters closed on Sundays, and some of the managers of the theaters chaperoned couples. Doug Webster, manager of the Place Theater in Commerce in the 1940s and 1950s, would reprimand students who got “too romantic.”

Despite this, movies were a popular form of recreation. L.J. Fite, class of 1940, recalled a movie date he had with Margaret Graham. He lacked money but “counted on seeing one of my buddies on the walk to town. Finally, while Margaret cooled her heels in front of the theater, I talked to my buddy about a 25-cent loan. The friend emptied his pockets—only two dines. Then he pulled out his handkerchief and a nickel fell out. We enjoyed the two-for-25-cents movie.”

Other forms of excitement—now commonplace among the contemporary student population—seem to have been less accessible. To get alcoholic beverages, students had to get it from local bootleggers, or they could pay 25 cents to get a prescription from a cooperative doctor who would declare that the student needed whiskey for his health. But it cost an additional 25 cents per pint for the medicine whiskey at the local drug store.