Perceptions of a university-school collaborative partnership

Issues of educator accountability and student achievement have almost demanded scientific research showing the impact of university- school partnerships. Assessing Professional Development School (PDS) partnerships in teacher education presents a challenge for researchers because of the uniqueness of each program and the lack of a universal definition, outlining a single prototype. PDS partnerships have become a model for school reform by underlining the need for collaboration between K-12 schools and universities. The desired outcome is education reform that occurs simultaneously between K-12 schools and at the university level. Although participants involved in PDS partnerships tend to attest to their value, connections between PDS activities and their impact on teaching have been hard to document. Using a mixed methods research design, this study examined the impact of the partnership of the University of Alabama and the Tuscaloosa City and County School Systems and then compared those findings to other PDS programs.