Stanford is widely recognized as one of the best universities for motivated students to attend to get an education; recently, it was also recognized as one of the best places to become a future educator.

In November 2007, Edutopia Magazine, a nonprofit organization profiling the people and ideas behind innovation in education, cited the Stanford Teacher Education Program (STEP) as one of the top ten leading schools of education. The nationally renowned STEP program leads to a Master of Arts in Education.

STEP faculty, students, and alumni alike expressed pride in this achievement.

“I can’t imagine STEP to be anything but one of the best in the country,” said STEP alumnus Jon Deane ‘95 M.A. ‘03, who is now teaching at Summit Preparatory High School in Redwood City.

Edutopia cited STEP’s integration of theory and practice as the reason for its outstanding program.

“At STEP students spend the whole year of the program in an actual classroom,” said current STEP student Pablo Aguilera ‘07.

“Teacher candidates are in the field from the first week of summer quarter,” added STEP Director Rachel Lotan. “Their assignments in STEP are also closely linked to their field work.”

Another notable area of STEP is its commitment to motivating education reform and serving urban students that lack access to quality education.

“It’s important that our graduates learn the best practices to serve children that have been traditionally underserved,” Lotan said, “and many of our graduates choose to go into schools that are hard to staff.”

During the program STEP students usually work in schools such as Eastside Preparatory in East Palo Alto, East Palo Alto Charter School and the June Jordan School for Equity.

“STEP is focused on creating teacher leaders,” Deane said. “It prepares you to teach in a heterogeneous classroom and to teach the whole student.”

Current STEP students — often called “STEPpies” — especially appreciate the intimate environment and strong support system in the program.

“All candidates are attached to a cooperating teacher at a partnering K-12 school, a supervisor who observes the candidate in the classroom and gives feedback and a faculty advisor,” Lotan said.

In the end, STEP candidates are students as well as teachers.

“STEP candidates live and work in two different worlds — the Stanford world and our teaching world,” Aguilera said. “Sometimes that can be stressful.”

To deal with that stress, students also develop strong friendships among themselves.

“There are only around 67 of us in the program this year,” Aguilera said. “So we barbeque and go out on weekends together. There’s definitely a big family atmosphere.”