A comprehensive study of teacher training in Russia, this book focuses on the present while also providing background information on tsarist and Soviet teacher training. The concluding chapter provides a provocative discussion of problems and challenges common to teacher training in Russia and America.

Having lived in Russia for extended periods of time since 1975, the authors base their book not only on scholarly sources but on their first-hand observations and experiences in Russian schools and teacher training institutions, and on questionnaires and interviews with Russian students, parents, teachers, administrators, and teacher educators.

The authors provide a comprehensive study of the lifelong teacher training process in Russia, starting with pedagogical gymnasiums and extending through training in colleges, institutes, universities, and public schools. The book focuses on the present but provides the reader with necessary background information on education of teachers during the tsarist and Soviet periods. Whether discussing teacher education under Alexander II, Stalin, Gorbachev, or Yeltsin, the Longs show the close interrelationship among general, school, and teacher education history. The book concludes with a provocative discussion of problems and challenges common to teacher training in Russia and America. The authors convincingly argue that effective reform of schools in either Russia or the United States must start with reform of teacher training.

The greatest obstacle to good public schools is the indifference of the American public to teacher education. The authors discuss the past, present, and future of American teacher education. They argue that the key to quality public schools is the recruitment and retention of quality teachers and that educational reforms should be evaluated primarily on whether they encourage or discourage quality teachers from making teaching a career.

The authors summarize the perspectives of nine prominent educational critics who collectively represent a broad spectrum of educational thought in 20th-century America:

John Dewey

Robert Hutchins

Arthur Bestor

James Conant

Theodore Brameld

Charles Silberman

Ivan Illich

Albert Shanker

Chester Finn

Each critic tackles, in a distinctive and provocative way, some of the perennial questions that should be considered in any effort to reform schools and teacher education.

In Part II the authors analyze the present-day status of teacher education and suggest how it might be improved. In Part III the authors speculate on what the future holds and how that will impact teacher education. The book concludes with an epilogue directed especially toward policymakers.