McLean County Unit District #5 offers a PDS experience close to Illinois State. Unit 5 is comprised of 15 elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools in 11 townships in the Central Illinois area. Your experience in the Normal school district provides the opportunity for you to learn in a large school district with geographic diversity, from city to rural schools. Long utilized as a site for Illinois State clinical experiences, this partnership has been expanded to provide a more comprehensive way to better prepare professional educators.
Thomas Metcalf Laboratory School offers PDS placements.
McLean County Unit District #5 offers a PDS experience close to Illinois State. Unit 5 is comprised of 15 elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools in 11 townships in the Central Illinois area. Your experience in the Normal school district provides the opportunity for you to learn in a large school district with geographic diversity, from city to rural schools. Long utilized as a site for Illinois State clinical experiences, this partnership has been expanded to provide a more comprehensive way to better prepare professional educators.
Thomas Metcalf Laboratory School offers PDS placements.
McLean County Unit District #5 offers a PDS experience close to Illinois State. Unit 5 is comprised of 15 elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools in 11 townships in the Central Illinois area. Your experience in the Normal school district provides the opportunity for you to learn in a large school district with geographic diversity, from city to rural schools. Long utilized as a site for Illinois State clinical experiences, this partnership has been expanded to provide a more comprehensive way to better prepare professional educators.
University High School, an Illinois State laboratory school, accepts a very limited number of PDS students each year. The selection process is competitive and the program is intensive. Students admitted as PDS interns are required to spend four hours every day at U-High working with their mentor teachers during the fall semester. They take classes on campus concurrently with this program. Candidates continue working with their mentor teachers in the spring semester as they "team teach" for the remainder of the year.
University High School is located one block north of campus, within easy walking distance of the College of Education. U-High enrolls approximately 600 students in grades 9-12 and hosts hundreds of teacher education candidates from Illinois State University each year. As one of the nation's oldest and most active laboratory schools, U-High continues to be on the cutting edge of teacher training.