School of Education

Demonstration of Content Knowledge

According to the educator preparation licensing law (PI 34.021(1)(c)), candidates must have demonstrated content knowledge prior to the closing date of the student teaching benchmark requirement window using one of the following options:

• 3.0 GPA or higher in all certified content subject areas.  The  courses included in the content GPA calculation depends on the licensure program (and are listed below)*.

OR 

• Passing score on the appropriate Praxis II Subject Assessment test(s)  (PRAXIS II GUIDE)
• To register for Praxis go to: https://www.ets.org/praxis/site.html

Course lists were developed by faculty in each program and include content knowledge preparation that is common to all pathways for a particular license. Pedagogy courses are not included as they require application of content knowledge.

• NEW Flexibility for Content Knowledge GPA:  Students may choose to take additional courses within a given Demonstration of Content Knowledge course list to improve their GPA in that content area, but the courses must be completed and graded by the benchmark date. The content GPA will be calculated using the highest grades for eligible courses (ie: if a content area requires one English  literature course, and a student has taken ENG 200 with a C and ENG 201 

Early Childhood (regular education), Elementary/Middle (regular education) and Special Education licenses must demonstrate content knowledge in all four subject areas:

Middle and High School Licenses (grades 4-12):

K-12 Licenses*: Art, Music, TSL, PE, SHE

* World language (Spanish and French) licenses require the ACTFL test to demonstrate content knowledge in that subject area