St. Cloud State University’s School of Education has evolved to become the College of Education and Learning Design.
With more than 150 years of preparing students to become teachers for Minnesota and beyond, the College of Education and Learning Design is taking on a new mission to impact the ecosystem of education more broadly through a focus on efforts to create educational equity and improve the learning landscape for future students and teachers.
The new name reflects the impact of the college’s program and the centrality and reach of its work within the university system and reestablishes the central significance of education professions to the mission and vision of St. Cloud State’s reimagined regional comprehensive university in the It’s Time framework.
“The college is an umbrella of research, scholarship, teaching and service that spans across the university as well as across the Minnesota State system, said Dr. Jennifer Mueller, dean of the College of Education and Learning Design.
The College of Education and Learning Design is looking to produce research and teachers to tackle the issue of racial disparity in educational outcomes while also looking to the future to design and innovate for systems of education that have not yet been imagined.
“We must address the Minnesota Paradox where we have a highly-regarded and well-respected education system, and yet some of the most significant disparities nationally of access, opportunity and outcomes across racial and ethnic groups,” Mueller said. “Our broad reach makes us poised to take on these challenges and contribute to a better Minnesota.”
Education has been a flagship for St. Cloud State University since its inception in 1869 as a teacher’s college. The institution opened with 53 students studying to become teachers, and the preparation of teachers has been a pillar of the institution ever since.
St. Cloud State now offers master’s and doctoral degrees to teachers looking to specialize or lead schools as principals or superintendents or serve students in a number of roles at the higher education level.
Today the College of Education and Learning Design is known nationally for its research and leadership in co-teaching. The Academy for Co-Teaching and Collaboration at St. Cloud State is a place that leads innovation in co-teaching and has prepared teachers to mentor fellow teachers from 48 states. St. Cloud State offers the National Conference on Co-Teaching and founded the National Association for Co-Teaching in 2019.
The School of Education was first formed as the College of Education in 1975, which led to a concentration on providing quality teacher education. The college grew quickly and became the fastest-growing major at St. Cloud State in the 1980s and began offering doctoral degrees in the 1990s. By 2002 St. Cloud State was the 10th largest producer of teachers in the country.
With the renaming will come a new level of focus and concentration on innovating the field of Education for a new generation of teachers.
“While we build from our past legacy, we also look forward,” Mueller said. “We will secure our role and responsibility in creating systems of education that we cannot yet imagine.
“This new name is aspiration as we incorporate the intentionally that must undergird our work.”
