Rage Against the Machine: Teacher Educators Try to Throw a Wrench in the (edTPA) Works

Abstract

Our concerns regarding the assumptions behind, politics of, and implications of using edTPA, an assessment tool purported to assess whether U.S. student teachers are “ready for the job” of teaching, are our primary focus here. We write from our perspectives as teacher educators in New York state, one of the states for which the edTPA is required for teacher licensure, drawing on diverse theoretical perspectives as we lay out our arguments against the problematic impacts of this so-called educational reform. We will strive to “connect the dots” as we see the multiple, and at times radical, changes to the field as all of a piece, making education just one more corporate project at the intersection of money, politics, and power. Last, we will offer some examples of as well as suggestions for resistance to this project, highlighting pedagogies of informed hope.