Message from the Dean
We appreciate the interest you are showing in the Reich College of Education and its programs by visiting our web page. Opportunities in the fields of teacher education and human services are numerous and the demand for graduates from our programs shows no sign of lessening over the coming years. The college has a long and rich tradition of preparing students to enter the public schools and other agencies of North Carolina as well as the region.
The beginning of the Reich College of Education can be traced to Watauga Academy founded in 1899 by B. B. Dougherty for the single purpose of training teachers. From that humble beginning emerged the comprehensive institution now known as Appalachian State University. The Reich College of Education is named after Ed and Lois Reich. As a result of their generosity, an endowment of over one million dollars was established which supports a substantial number of scholarships for students preparing to enter the teaching profession. Lois Reich was a teacher and administrator in the Davidson County schools and her husband Ed was a dentist in Winston-Salem/Forsyth County. Together they had a deep and abiding faith in the power of education that led to their support of programs in the college.
Although the college has as a major part of its mission the preparation of teachers, it is a diversified unit with other highly acclaimed programs as well. Among those are the Communications Disorders program, multiple programs in Counseling, and a variety of programs in Higher Education, School Administration, Library Science, Technology, and Educational Leadership. As you peruse our site, some of that diversity will become readily apparent. Central to all of our programs, however, is our conceptual framework. This framework is knowledge-based, reflects current research, and its overall philosophy and purpose provide a rationale for our coursework, field and clinical experiences.
Our framework reflects the current literature on the social nature of learning and is based on a "community of practice" model of teaching and learning which offers multicultural and global perspectives. We hope the information at our site will give you a better understanding of the Reich College of Education and its programs and activities. Please feel free to contact any unit in the college or my office for further information.
Again, thank you for your interest in Appalachian State University and the Reich College of Education.
Dr. Charles R. Duke
Dean, Reich College of Education
