Prepare for a fulfilling teaching career through Widener’s undergraduate secondary education (grades 7-12) certification program, where you’ll learn how to teach adolescents while gaining mastery in your chosen subject area.
Prepare for a fulfilling teaching career in grades 7-12 through Widener’s undergraduate secondary education certification program. You’ll learn the ins and outs of being a teacher through the Center for Education while concurrently majoring in your chosen content area in the College of Arts and Sciences.
Our program makes you eligible to earn grade 7-12 Pennsylvania teaching certification in Biology, Chemistry, Earth and Space Science, English, Mathematics, Physics, Social Studies (History), and Spanish.
Widener University's Center for Education is proud of its 2016 NCATE accreditation award and is prepared to meet the renewed rigor and relevance of excellence by seeking accreditation based on the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) Standards in 2023. CAEP accreditation eligible programs take steps to maintain gapless national accreditation for educator preparation. See CAEP Standards and Annual Impact & Outcome Measures
You'll major in the College of Arts & Sciences subject area of your choice, all while working toward your Pennsylvania Instructional I teaching certification in Secondary Education 7-12.
View the Loading... for major options within the humanities, social sciences, and sciences through the College of Arts & Sciences.
Earn certification in your chosen subject area(s): Biology, Chemistry, Earth and Space Science, English, Mathematics, Physics, Social Studies (History), and Spanish.
View the Loading... for curriculum and coursework requirements for the teaching certification.
Eight education courses are required for secondary certification, including appropriate courses in teaching methods for the selected certification area.
In addition, students must adjust his or her subject-matter academic work to meet the requirements for a full-time, 14-week student teaching experience during the senior year. This student teaching experience, open to seniors only, is under the supervision of a professor from the teacher education program and also experienced teachers from local cooperating schools.
Once enrolled, the following requirements must be completed before admission to the undergraduate teacher certification program:
Our undergraduate program in secondary education gives you the skills and preparation to teach adolescents in grades 7-12 in your chosen subject area.
Gain a strong teaching foundation by earning a degree in your chosen content area through the College of Arts & Sciences while you learn how to teach adolescents through your course studies at the Center for Education. Plus, we’ll guide you through the requirements for secondary education certification in your particular subject.
Our class sizes are small, giving you the opportunity to build meaningful relationships with faculty at both the Center for Education and the College of Arts and Sciences. Our faculty are committed to engaging students in the learning process through active, hands-on learning, which optimizes your learning experience to meet your personal and professional goals.
You'll develop field experience gradually throughout your college experience, starting with one-on-one tutoring and small-group instruction and culminating with whole-class instruction through a semester-long student teaching placement. By the time you graduate, you’ll feel comfortable and confident in the classroom.
Our professors invest in your success through close mentoring and continual feedback. Get to know our secondary education faculty.
"Learning to be a teacher requires discipline and hard work. Learning to be great teacher requires passion and a deep dedication to the many and diverse children that we serve."
"I have authored or co-authored 15 publications in top-tier education journals and am honored to be a highly rated online professor of Widener students."
"My teaching focuses upon cognitive processing and application. In this regard, critical literacy complements the cognitive learning process. Critical literacy is the ability to actively read a text that promotes an understanding of social concepts and human relationships."
"I want my students to feel nurtured by a professor who cares about their well-being, challenged by a professor who insists they ask hard questions, made a little uncomfortable by a professor who refuses to give the 'right' answer, and excited by a professor who is always looking for something new."
"I believe classroom culture should include opportunities to create community through social justice values, respect, and equality for everyone. Teachers must include students' needs and interests, their knowledge from personal experiences, interactions, opportunities to explore hands-on activities, social-emotional regulation through positive behavior supports, and self-constructed inquiry and knowledge through questioning."
"Students become historians by "doing history" – they learn to think critically about the past, to develop research questions and conduct research, . . . and to have fun! History is an endlessly fascinating inquiry into the human past that can yield essential insights into the human present."
"My interests include brain development, literacy development, and applications of technology in research and instruction. My greatest excitement in teaching comes from the way that working with graduate students spills over to my teaching of undergraduates and vice versa."
"My role as a mathematics teacher is to help students make sense of mathematics and develop conceptual understanding. I do this by helping students become actively involved in their learning through solving new and challenging problems rather than passively absorbing information."
With a Widener degree, you will take the inside track to a noble career as a teacher. You will shape the education and growth of future generations.
Kapelski Learning Center, Room 209
Hyatt Hall
Room 119