Washington, D.C. --Arthur E. Wise announced today that he will leave the presidency of NCATE on June 30, 2008, after serving in that role for 18 years.

Art came to NCATE because he believed that it held great potential to improve the quality and capacity of the Nation’s teaching force. Improving the teaching force is the single most important public policy strategy for improving education. It is also essential to closing the achievement gap. So long as there remains a shortage of caring, competent, qualified teachers, the Nation’s poor and minority schoolchildren will be taught by unprepared and under-prepared teachers.

Under his leadership, NCATE has been a catalyst for the reform of teacher preparation institutions:

• In 2001, NCATE became one of the first accrediting agencies to use candidate performance data as the basis for accreditation decisions. This expectation led institutions and their faculty to redesign instruction and assessment to demonstrate that candidates have developed the knowledge, skills, and professional dispositions necessary to help all students learn.

• The State/NCATE Partnership Program has resulted in 50 state partnerships and the integration of state and professional expectations. State acceptance of professional accreditation is a cornerstone in the development of a profession.

• NCATE has led the field in the appropriate alignment of standards. Standards for teacher preparation, P-12 students, teacher licensing, teacher testing, and advanced certification now reinforce each other.

• NCATE has facilitated the improvement of most teacher preparation programs at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, the institutions that prepare the majority of African American teacher candidates.

• NCATE expectations for technology integration continue to reshape teacher preparation and its accreditation.

• NCATE has provided leadership for professional development schools--one of the most important innovations in teacher preparation and induction--now found at hundreds of sites.

• The number of NCATE institutions has grown from under 500 to over 700, producing two-thirds of the Nation’s new teacher graduates.

Recent studies have revealed that the academic quality of candidates has increased and that new teachers are beginning their careers with more knowledge and teaching skill than in the past. NCATE and teacher preparation have come a long way in the past two decades though more remains to be done, especially to serve the Nation’s poor and minority schoolchildren.

Sharon P. Robinson, President and CEO of AACTE, member of NCATE’s Executive Board and Chair of its Finance, Personnel and Membership Committee said, “Art has been an outspoken advocate for the Nation’s underserved schoolchildren and one of the strongest advocates for a profession of teaching. Under his leadership, NCATE has been a significant force in teacher education reform and its accreditation. He leaves NCATE a strong organization poised to continue to provide leadership.”

During his career, Art has worked toward teacher quality and professionalism, school finance reform, and the advancement of educational research.

At NCATE, he led efforts to develop a system of quality assurance for the teaching profession. He is co-author of A License to Teach, a blueprint for the professionalization of teaching.

Art first came to national prominence as the author of Rich Schools , Poor Schools: The Promise of Equal Educational Opportunity . That 1968 book conceived the idea of the school finance reform lawsuit. Since then, a majority of state supreme courts have ordered the equalization of state school finance systems, boosting spending in poor districts and narrowing the disparity with affluent districts.

His 1979 book, Legislated Learning, anticipated the call for teacher professionalism. As senior social scientist and director of the RAND Corporation’s Center for the Study of the Teaching Profession, he proposed education policies concerned with teacher licensing, teacher evaluation, and teacher compensation. Many of these proposals have been incorporated into state laws and regulations.

Long active in federal education policy Art was associate director for research, National Institute of Education, Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Subsequently, at the Office of Management and Budget, he helped to create the separate cabinet-level U.S. Department of Education. On a number of occasions he has testified before Congress on policies to improve education and educational research.

Art’s previous positions include Associate dean and associate professor of education at the University of Chicago ; Captain in the U.S. Army and assistant director of research at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point ; and Visiting Scholar, ETS. He is a graduate of the Boston (Public) Latin School , Harvard College , and received an MBA and a Ph.D. in education from the University of Chicago . He has made hundreds of presentations, published scores of articles, and received numerous awards.

Said Art, “Being president of NCATE is the best job I have had. It has allowed me to combine my passion for serving the Nation’s poor children and my commitments to educational research and teaching as a profession into an action-oriented program for improving the Nation’s education schools and teachers.”

Art plans to bike, hike and kayak while deciding what challenge to pursue next.