Self-Empowerment in Seance

This paT:er reports on the outcomes of an ongoing action research project with elementary teachers who are attempting to bring a science emphasis to their teaching and in which preservice teachers are matched with inservice teachers who are interested in improving their practice through a focus on science. The project is a modified version of a professional practice school that includes an emphasis on the improvement of professional practice and on teacher empowerment in science. The effort to move from a traditional university-driven model of professional development for preservice education to one that leads to teacher-driven, emancipatory practice at the classroom level began at San Jose State University in the fall of 1993. Changes since that time include: (1) establishment of a collaborative relationship among university faculty, student teachers, and classroom teachers that has resulted in a community of co-learners; and (2) efforts to move from research which is theory driven to theory-generating research. Results to date have implications for expectations of the amount of time necessary to effect local systemic change as well as the multiplicity of tasks at many levels that must be carried out, and confirm the value of long term investments of resources for reform agendas. Contains 19