(JT:  Jim Tagg, Interviewer)

MG:  I was really proud of the U of L Teacher Ed. Program.  The idea of the theory/practice.  You go out and do some practicum, you come back and take some courses, and you keep doing that.  And the policy that we had of at least, well it wasn’t written, but about 80% of the faculty had to have been classroom teachers and stuff like this and…

JT:  I didn’t know that.  I didn’t know that.

MG:  It was kind of unwritten but that was pretty much standard.  And the faculty had to do the supervision.  I think that's pretty much all gone.

JT:  But, I think those are great things.

MG:  But they just can’t be sustained, I don’t think.

JT:  You were in that program as a student already, and that program didn’t change that much when you were there.

MG:  In fact as long as I was there, that was still pretty much the philosophy behind it.

JT:  Have they changed it, now, around the turn of the millineum?

MG:  I would say so.  I think there are very few faculty that supervise.  Now, I think it’s much more of a university, or arts and science model ... research, you know that kind of thing, and it’s probably not possible to do it otherwise anymore but ... I don’t know.  It's not the same faculty.  And that may be good or bad.  If you’ve left when it was one way you always think that way was better but ...

JT:  I don’t know but you think that’s a big turning point at the University, was probably the time after you left?

MG:  I think that's the biggest change in the Faculty of Education.  And partly, that may have started with the grad program because when you’ve got grad studies you’ve got to have research.  And it used to be that the research was classroom oriented and now it’s whatever, so ...

JT:  What do you think was the best thing about those years here?

MG:  What’s the best thing?  About the program itself, I think there were some wonderful things like Ed 2500, the theory/practice, all the practicums, that kind of thing, the women’s studies and so on.  I loved the faculty.  I just thought there were some really neat people there and I really liked working there.  And the whole university, you know, it just had a really nice feel then. 

JT:  Well the characters ...

MG:  Yeah, yeah.  But I remember Eric Mokosh saying one time, 'A faculty like ours can always tolerate two or three characters but if they become the norm, or the majority then we’re in trouble,' sort of thing.  

And even in the later part when I was there when we switched to the combined degrees and the internship and so on.  Whether or not it was a good idea, it brought new thinking and new excitement and all of that kind of thing.  Because it’s pretty easy to rest on your laurels and keep doing the same old thing.