Info
Visit
Apply
Deposit

BETHANY, W.Va. – Bethany College has announced the hiring of a new chair of the Education Department and director of teacher preparation programs.

Charline Barnes RowlandCharline Barnes Rowland, Ed.D., joins Bethany from the University of Pittsburgh, where she was teaching consultant (professional development) and diversity program coordinator at the University Center for Teaching & Learning. In 2019, she received the Center’s Advancing Educational Excellence Award.

Rowland also joins the Bethany faculty as an associate professor of teacher education.

“We are very fortunate to have an experienced educator and administrator like Dr. Rowland to lead our Education program into a bright future,” Provost and Dean of Faculty Joe Lane said. “She has done wonderful work in the field of educator preparation, is familiar with the accreditation standards that we aspire to exceed, and has worked in West Virginia for many years. Her leadership will be essential as we strive to make Bethany’s Education programs the very best in our state and region.”

A first-generation college graduate, Rowland has a Doctor of Education from Virginia Tech, a Master of Arts in Education with an emphasis in reading education from George Washington University, and a Bachelor of Arts in English education and psychology from Syracuse University.

“I’m excited to join Bethany College where teaching is essential to its mission,” Rowland said. “I’m excited to lead the Education Department in preparing future and current teachers to strive to be the best in their disciplines, but also in advocating for marginalized students and their families who are ever present in our schools.”

Rowland previously was associate professor in the Department of Curriculum & Instruction/Literacy Studies and statewide campus director of Health Sciences Technology Academy (HSTA) Summer Institute at West Virginia University. In 2014, she was selected to become a member of the WVU Women’s Leadership Initiative.

She has also taught at other private and public institutions in Michigan, New York, Iowa and South Dakota. Rowland was a former classroom teacher in Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia. In 2003, she was a Core U.S. Fulbright Scholar at the University of the West Indies in Barbados.

In other news, Bethany has entered a partnership with the Association for Advancing Quality in Educator Preparation in two-year process designed to improve the college’s education and teacher preparation programs.

“We are confident that AAQEP’s cooperative approach to adopting new and improved methods for preparing new teachers will help us build on Bethany’s long history of providing excellent teachers for K-12 classrooms in West Virginia and across the country,” Lane said.

ABOUT BETHANY COLLEGE

Bethany College, founded in 1840, is the oldest private college in West Virginia. The Bethany experience focuses on academic excellence in the area of liberal arts and prepares students for a lifetime of work and a life of significance.