The highest value for any educational institution has been acclaimed to be teachers teaching and students learning. Grambling State University, in its Statement of Mission, endorses this value by considering teaching and learning as its "raison d'etre." Correspondingly, this priority of the University includes the concept central to the purpose of the College of Education. That purpose is to effect quality teaching and learning in elementary, secondary, preschool and non-school settings, through the preparation of teachers and administrators as educational leaders. Uniquely, our purpose is to advance this priority as a lifelong human experience. The College of Education contributes to imparting the charge of making sure that human beings, from childhood through adulthood, are well educated. It is the College of Education which holds lifelong teaching and learning as its core value.
A commitment to lifelong teaching and learning demands an engagement in a study of pedagogy which links the insights of theory and experience to concerns for basic and best practice. The concerns for practice demand linkage with our colleagues in elementary schools, secondary schools, and non-school settings, as well as with colleagues in other colleges and schools of the University. In this way, a comprehensive configuration of education is validated and a partnership model of educational preparation is constituted a model which appropriately attends to a strong foundation in the Arts and Sciences, the interdependent nature of teaching and learning, values which foster human dignity, and the educative meaning of leadership.
This commitment to lifelong teaching and learning also demands an environment where scholarship is viewed as lifelong. Our task is to create an environment where scholarship is encouraged, supported, realized and consistent with the University's criteria of excellence, yet reflective of the special demands of basic and best practice.
Fundamentally, the purpose of the College of Education is to expand upon the motto of the University: "A Place Where Everybody is Somebody." This motto embraces our faculty, students, and the children, youth and adults whom they serve. Necessarily, our vision includes a focus on opportunity in our cultural environment, an environment to be experienced by all, In environment inclusive of diversity, ethnicity and race. Through services of our faculty and graduates, equipped with a loud and rigorous knowledge and practice base, we can elevate the promise of individual lives.
