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- Dr. Ed Steiner
College of Education Faculty Oral Histories
Dr. Ed Steiner
ES: Well the state passed a law that every school district would have a teacher education center. The state allocated funds to schools which were to be used to contract with outside persons such as university faculty members to provide in-service training and development for the K-12 teachers and administrators. That was very effective. It was really a good plan. It was a good program, and it brought us even closer to the schools and enabled us to provide a lot of service and many, many teachers, some of them still teaching today, were able to complete master’s degrees, even doctoral degrees. Faculty members of the College of Education would even go so far as take programs out to the school district, even to remote locations. Faculty would travel there and advise students and teach the classes. Students could complete the advanced graduate degrees on site, rather than having to drive into campus. There were many types of programs that we had to help the teachers. The state plan called for school districts to determine what kind of in-service preparation they needed for their teachers and then would identify one or more faculty members of a university or community college that would be able to provide that service and meet that need.
It turned out that the school districts of the state choose to contract more with USF faculty than with any other university or college. Most faculty members from USF were from the College of Education, although some were members of departments of other colleges at USF. Overall, school districts contracted more hours with USF faculty than with faculty members of all other universities and colleges in the state combined. We were really pretty busy and devoting much time to work in local schools. Personally, I did spend a lot of times in the schools conducting training sessions, developing programs and advising teachers regarding their graduate studies. At the same time I was teaching classes, advising students and serving as a department chair. After several successful years, the state Teacher Education Center (TEC) program was not renewed and funding was eliminated. A formalized structure for joint efforts between universities and school districts was lacking. This made it more difficult to form relationships. Faculty members returned to less formal arrangements and took the initiative to develop programs that would address the needs of teachers and the school districts and that would facilitate research into improving teaching and learning.
LB: There are some other projects in the College such as the SCATT program. Bill Katzenmeyer told me how it got started. I know that as an associate dean that you were involved with the SCATT program and in their activities. What do you think SCATT did for the College?
ES: It did attract a lot of students and in a short period of time developed a very positive reputation. The students that went through the SCATT program were in very high demand. It was a common belief that when SCATT students would graduate and go out to the classroom. They had the reputation that they were ready to teach, they knew how to teach, and they were very effective teachers from the first day they walked into the class. There were even reports that some school districts would bring contracts when they would come to the College of Education before the students had graduated and offer them contracts contingent upon their graduation right there without going to the school district to interview. It was a very effective program that enhanced the excellent preparation students were receiving in the various teacher preparation programs in the College. Membership in SCATT was a voluntary thing for the students. Students were required to successfully complete additional activities on there own and there was no course credit awarded for those activities. The program had a very good reputation and the students were very high in demand. Many SCATT students wanted to go the extra mile and put in the extra time and it paid off for them. Many of the people that went through the SCATT program as students here at USF are leaders in the schools now. They have a mind set of going the extra mile and doing what it takes to do a first rate job.
LB: Can you speak about some of the faculty members that you worked with in Secondary Education over the years. It seems that faculty came and completed their careers here, even though they had offers elsewhere. Was that the case in the Secondary Education Department?
ES: Definitely. There was a time when I didn’t really notice much of a change in faculty members who were in the College. I remember saying to people that when I had been in the Dean’s office as an associate dean for maybe five or ten years, that I could count on one hand the number of faculty who left to take a position someplace else. It was just a good college, a good university, and a lot of hard work but it was rewarding in that people where doing what they wanted to do and they could see that they were making a difference. There was not much turnover during the earlier years. And there still isn’t much turnover today. I think there is a little bit more, but I haven’t been as close to it so I don’t know for sure. I recall advising faculty search committees to be sure that a person the committee was going to recommend for a faculty position was someone with strong academic credentials and someone with whom they would like to work, because it was very likely that the individual would be here at USF for the rest of his or her professional life. Committee members were urged to recommend someone that would be a good colleague, who would interact well with others, is a good collaborator, because the person would probably be here for a long time.
LB: Your contributions as a faculty member, department chair and certainly an associate dean have been too numerous to list here, but from your perspective which of the many of achievements do you identify as being the most satisfying to you, which your most proud.
ES: I was in the Associate Dean role for 15 years. It was a longer period of time than I was in any other position at USF. My major responsibility was the fiscal welfare of the College of Education. I feel that over all those years we were always on solid ground. We never had a year when the College was in the red. If that had happened, there could have been serious consequences for the College, for the dean and for me. Remaining solvent was no easy task. There were always many worthy projects and needs, that required funds and resources that were always limited. There was an on-going assessment of those projects and needs. Soon after I became an associate dean, efforts were increased to facilitate faculty research and obtaining external funding that would provide those needed resources. In 1980, grant projects in the College totaled approximately $500,000.
Efforts to obtain more external funding were quite successful. The total of grant and contract funds increased substantially during the ensuing years. By 1995, the year I left the associate dean position, external funding totaled about 12 or 13 million dollars. There was quite an improvement in that period of time. We were also very much involved in recruiting faculty and supporting the search committees. For the last several years that I was an associate dean, we were successful in substantially increasing the diversity of faculty members of the College. Increases were realized in minority faculty, women, and other categories of faculty members. Those are some of the accomplishments that I believe contributed to the College’s mission and goals during those years. I guess when you look at it on a day to day basis there was always a challenge. It seemed that about the time I would think that College finances were in order, there would be a budget cut. We had many of those over the years. Each time, it was very difficult to determine where funds could be reduced and at the same time, preserve and maintain the quality of programs.