An investigation of the inclusion of multicultural education in public and private teacher training programs in the State of Delaware

The purpose of this study was to identify and describe the inclusion of multicultural education goals and/or objectives in teacher education programs in the State of Delaware. This was determined via a survey of faculty, evaluation of course syllabi, evaluation of textbooks, and review of public documents on the world wide web that included mission statements of the institutions studied. Three Delaware institutions of higher education participated in this study.;The results showed that chairpersons of departments of education and faculty in the participating institutions considered multicultural education an important part of what their new students should experience in teacher education. Survey results showed that 93.02% of the respondents indicated that they include multicultural education in their courses. However, actual practice of this lacked evidence in course syllabi and textbooks. It is possible that faculty in the institutions studied focused on multicultural education in informal ways that were not listed on their course syllabi.;The results of this study also indicated that teacher education programs should strengthen the evaluation of their multicultural education emphases to determine the impact of stand alone multicultural education courses versus multicultural educational program infusion. Judging from the results of this study, it is also important for institutions of teacher education to identify their values and vision clearly in relation to the philosophy and implementation of multicultural education.