Teacher Certification plus Master's Degree in Elementary Education
If you have a Bachelor's degree in any field, and want to become an elementary school teacher in Texas, come learn with us and earn Early Childhood through 6th grade English as a Second Language (EC-6 ESL) Teacher Certification through a 30-hour program of coursework that includes a Master of Education (MEd) degree. These courses may be taken at either the San Marcos campus or the Round Rock campus.
In the department of C&I at Texas State, we are committed to helping future teachers become skilled, ethical and thoughtful educators. We value a diversity of experiences and the experience of diversity. We use these values to build on our students' personal experiences to help them learn to teach and design learning environments for the students of Texas' elementary schools as they obtain early EC-6 ESL certification.
Teach'em Up Cats!
Certification + Master’s Degree is TWO in ONE
Due to the unique opportunity provided by obtaining a master’s degree Due to the unique opportunity provided by obtaining a master’s degree at the same time as earning teacher certification, this program involves working with two entities simultaneously: The Graduate College of TXST and the Office of Educator Preparation (OEP). The graduate college will provide you a DEGREE plan. OEP will provide you a CERTIFICATION plan. Therefore, you must first be admitted to the Graduate College, and then apply to OEP to obtain your certification plan.
You will have two advisors.
Your graduate advisor will assist in choosing coursework that applies to both your degree and your certification (along with graduation applications and master’s comprehensive exams). The OEP Certification Officer will assist in completion of the state-administered certification examinations, Student Teaching and/or Internships.
Please contact the graduate advisor for the program you hope to enter for more information:
For Elementary Grades [PK-6] - Dr. Tim Kinard: elemedgrad@txstate.edu
For Middle School Grades [4-8] - Dr. Gwynne Ash: gwynne@txstate.edu
For Secondary Grades [7-12] - Dr. Jeffery King: jtk32@txstate.edu
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Apply Now to the
Elementary Education (Teacher Certification in Early Childhood through Grade Six ESL) (M.Ed.)
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Our Mission
Our elementary teacher certification + Master's in Education (C+MEd) program is designed to prepare future teachers to identify, understand, and disrupt thinking that positions elementary students as having deficits in their capabilities or home lives, or as lacking in knowledge and skills. We work to disrupt this thinking in order to help our graduate students build classroom environments and curricula that utilize and celebrate the problem-solving, linguistic, and theory-building skills students learn at home (and in the languages of home). We are committed to helping our graduate students be active in the mission of making schools "read" for students, rather than expecting students to be "ready for school," based on a harming definition of "readiness" that serves some but marginalizes others.
We are also committed to helping our graduate students learn to create classroom environments that foster student ownership of learning and equitable opportunities for learning while designing, adapting, and implementing coherent instruction through evidence-based practices for diverse communities (e.g. schools serving differing ethnicities, languages, cultures, races, sexualities, as well as cognitive, academic, physical, emotional, and social proclivities). This commitment is in keeping with Texas State University's mission as a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI).
Pillars Guiding Our Program
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Culturally Sustaining
Promotes equitable and excellent teaching and learning that sustains and revitalizes students' cultural, linguistic, and familiar resources and builds on local nd global citizenship. Culturally sustaining practices include an expansive view of equality in pursuit of social justice.
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Community-Based
Advocates for students, their families, and their communities at school, district, local and national levels and upholds additive perspectives with the goal of recognizing that all members of our community are valued contributors, resources, and learners.
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Practice-Informed
Acknowledges that teacher candidates must engage with teaching practices that are built upon carefully sequenced clinical learning experiences. Targeted coursework that supports the analysis of teaching practices, opportunities to try out elements of the practices using simulations or other coaching strategies, enactments of the practices with elementary aged students, and reflection on these enactments will interrupt inequities and promote social justice.
Important Links
Prospective Students
