LOS ANGELES (January 10, 2018) – The University of Southern California Rossier School of Education (USC Rossier) in Los Angeles recently partnered with Edthena to incorporate video coaching into its newly redesigned Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) program. Teacher candidates will use the video-based classroom observation platform throughout the duration of the program to track their progress in the areas of planning, instruction, and assessment, as well as to submit their preliminary licensure assessment.
“When we launched our online MAT in 2009, we made the bold decision to integrate video fully into the design of our program,” said Karen Symms Gallagher, dean of USC Rossier. “With this new partnership with Edthena, we are not only improving on this invaluable and essential practice, we are also providing the tools that will increase effectiveness for new teachers who will be leading classrooms throughout the nation."
In the past nine years, the MAT program offered by USC Rossier has graduated more than 4,000 teachers nationally and globally, the majority of whom are teaching in hard-to-staff schools.
“We’ve found video analysis to be essential to our teacher candidates’ experience, development, and achievement,” said John Pascarella, chair of the MAT program at USC Rossier. “It engages teacher candidates, their peers, and their instructors in joint examinations of teaching and gives them the opportunity to slow down and view the learning taking place in an evidence-based way. The Edthena platform and user experience, which far exceeds our previous video software, will help take this to the next level.”
With the Edthena platform, teachers quickly and easily upload videos of their classroom instruction. They then share those videos with peers and coaches, and receive timestamped comments categorized as questions, suggestions, strengths, and notes. The platform enables teachers and their coaches to participate in collaborative professional learning cycles throughout the duration of the MAT program, including student teaching.
“Video-based reflection and feedback helps aspiring teachers, as well as seasoned educators, improve their instructional practices,” said Adam Geller, founder and CEO of Edthena. “We look forward to providing USC Rossier with the technology needed to use video to help teacher candidates successfully accelerate their professional growth.”
Schools, districts, and teacher education programs in nearly 30 states – including California – are using the Edthena platform to make video observation an integral part of teacher induction, teacher mentoring, PLCs, and peer observation.
To learn more about Edthena, visit https://www.edthena.com. To learn more about USC Rossier, visit https://rossier.usc.edu.
About USC Rossier
The mission of the USC Rossier School of Education is to prepare leaders to achieve educational equity through research, policy, and practice. Consistently ranked as one of the nation’s premier education schools by U.S. News & World Report, USC Rossier draws on innovative thinking and collaborative research to improve learning opportunities and outcomes, address disparities and solve the most intractable problems in education.
About Edthena
Edthena is the leading classroom observation platform for using teaching videos as part of professional development. Teachers upload classroom videos to share with colleagues who leave time-stamped comments. Edthena also offers specialized collaboration tools to help organizations implement best practices for video-based professional learning. Edthena is the recipient of numerous awards from organizations such as SIIA, District Administration, and Tech & Learning. For more information, visit www.edthena.com. For more news about Edthena, visit blog.edthena.com.
