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A program funded by the federal Department of Education to improve student learning by placing greater emphasis on subject content in teacher education invites faculty in South Carolina's four public research universities to participate.

The South Carolina Research Universities and Education Foundation (SCUREF), a 10-year-old consortium, including MUSC, Clemson University, the University of South Carolina and South Carolina State University, submitted a pre-application to the Department of Education in early April that was highly rated, and SCUREF has now been invited to submit a full application, due on July 9.

This fundamental change proposed by the program is based on the premise that too many teachers do not possess the requisite knowledge in the areas which they are assigned to teach, such as mathematics, science, language arts, and social studies.

The program proposes that faculties of schools of arts and sciences work more closely with faculty of schools of education to reform and revitalize teacher education curricula and specifically to integrate content knowledge into the curricula in a more effective manner.

The partnership envisioned for the proposed program will involve SCUREF universities, four private historically black colleges in South Carolina, and 20 public school districts. The curriculum revisions will be developed by discipline-specific working groups staffed by public school teachers and higher education faculty. The working groups will meet monthly over the five-year period of the proposed program. Participants will be paid an honorarium and their travel to meetings will be compensated at standard rates for state employees.

Interested MUSC faculty in science and mathematics should contact Edward A. Hamilton, SCUREF associate director, at (864) 656-0226 of by e-mail at hamilte@clemson.edu.