All of us know it is true -- the first rule that new teachers learn is to forget most of what they learned in their education classes back in college. Indeed, some of the worst teaching we experience comes from our education professors, so following that advice is not difficult.

This should be a shining moment for education schools. Never has the nation paid so much attention to improving the quality of teaching. Yet the institutions that produce teachers have never faced so much criticism.

"Teacher education is the Dodge City of the education world," said Arthur Levine, former president of Columbia University's Teachers College. "Like the fabled Wild West town, it is unruly and chaotic."

Stanford University educational historian David F. Labaree wrote in a recent book: "Institutionally, the ed school is the Rodney Dangerfield of higher education; it don't get no respect. The ed school is the butt of jokes in the university, where professors portray it as an intellectual wasteland."

The attacks have become so frequent and intense that some educators say they have gone too far. But a growing number of educators say ed schools fail to give teachers enough background in their subject matter, fail to prepare them for the difficulties of urban schools and fail to recruit the best students.

For a study on ed schools released in September, Levine surveyed administrators with firsthand knowledge of these problems: principals. Only two of every five principals surveyed said ed schools were preparing teachers very well or moderately well to get new curriculum and performance standards into the classroom. Only one-third said their teachers were very or moderately well prepared for maintaining classroom order. Only one-fifth said their teachers were that well prepared to work with parents.

Of course, there is little agreement on what to do to make things better. I'll put in my two-cents worth on the matter.

1) Require that students get a degree in their subject matter. My college allowed education students to take two fewer classes in their subject area so that they could take teaching methods classes. I had already taken the full class-load for a regular history degree before switching to the education program, so I was the exception among my classmates in having just as much preparation as a student seeking a regular degree.

2) Make education degrees a five-year program. Heck, maybe make it a Master's degree program.

3) Talk about how to deal with parents. My first parent conference was at 22, during student teaching. Many of my colleagues didn't have their first until after they were hired. It is a daunting experience, and one that most new teachers are ill-prepared for.

4) It is all nice to prepare teachers for a classroom where every kid has a computer at home, reads on grade level, and isn't worried about the food and shelter components of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. That isn't where I teach, nor is it where most teachers teach. help us learn about real kids, not ideal kids -- or the children of professors at the campus laboratory schppl.